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Wilson ends Imola test on high

Britain's Justin Wilson has finished International Formula 3000 testing at Imola on a high by setting the fastest time of the two-day test, demoting Wednesday's top man Jaime Melo into second place

Melo, who switches to the Durango team for this year, managed to hold on to the top spot on day one and looked set to top the time sheets for a second consecutive day, but Wilson pipped the Brazilian by just 0.049s in his Nordic Lola.

Wilson set his fastest time of 1m37.851s during the morning session and was all ready to go for an even quicker lap in the afternoon, but the 1998 Formula Palmer Audi Champion pushed too hard on his first set of tyres after lunch and ended up in the tyre barrier. The 22-year-old emerged unhurt, but the accident brought his testing to an end.

"I was very pleased with the time," said Wilson. "The car is working really well and we are over a second faster here than we were last year. I tried too hard early on and had the accident. It wasn't a big impact, just damaging the rear corner and rear wing."

Super Nova's Mark Webber improved to move up from ninth to third place after the Australian reacquainted himself with his F3000 machine following a winter of testing for the Benetton Formula 1 team.

Webber's team mate Mario Haberfeld, who spent much of day one in first place, finished in fifth spot, but was held up by a trip through the gravel. The Brazilian hit a tyre wall which hampered progress, but running was further delayed when a rope snapped as marshals were loading the stricken Lola onto a recovery truck, damaging the rear end.

"I think today was good, especially the afternoon," said Haberfeld. "In the morning I made a very big mistake crashing in the fourth lap and then it didn't help that they dropped my car and I lost the rest of the session."

Red Bull Junior driver Patrick Freisacher finished an improved fourth while team mate Antonio Garcia, who won the Formula Nissan Championship last year could only manage 12th place.

Nordic's Tomas Enge took seventh spot just ahead of Arden International's Darren Manning. But in an impressive sixth was Rodrigo Sperafico for the Italian Coloni outfit while twin brother Ricardo, who teams up with ninth-placed Antonio Pizzonia at Petrobras, was four places behind in 10th.

"We did some tests with old tyres and the car felt very fast," said Sperafico, "We then put the new tyres on and we had a little oversteer, but I think we can resolve this."

The Durango team has yet to confirm Jaime Melo's team mate an Soheil Ayari took over from Gabriele Lancieri on the second day and moved the car up four places. Conversely, Minardi F1 driver did not drive the Junior team's cars of David Saelens and Andrea Piccini, which both dropped 13 places.

German Formula 3 Champion Giorgio Pantano was a disappointing 21st and was surprisingly beaten by Indonesian team mate Ananda Mikola by 1.12s.

Testing continues next week for the top teams at a private session at the Jerez circuit in southern Spain.


Justin Wilson, Nordic, 1m37.851s
Jaime Melo, Durango Formula, 1m37.900s
Mark Webber, Super Nova, 1m38.235s
Patrick Freisacher, Red Bull Junior Team, 1m38.436s
Mario Haberfeld, Super Nova, 1m38.453s
Rodrigo Sperafico, Coloni, 1m38.489s
Tomas Enge, Nordic, 1m38.511s
Darren Manning, Arden, 1m38.560s
Antonio Pizzonia, Petrobras, 1m38.634s
Ricardo Sperafico, Petrobras, 1m38.677s
Sebastien Bourdais, DAMS, 1m38.772s
Antonio Garcia, Red Bull Junior Team, 1m38.436s
Bas Leinders, KTR, 1m39.139s
Fabrizio Gollin, Coloni, 1m39.234s
Viktor Maslov, Arden, 1m39.327s
David Saelens, European Minardi Junior, 1m39.345s
Derek Hill, DAMS, 1m39.352s
Soheil Ayari, Durango Formula, 1m39.402s
Fernando Alonso (Andrea Piccini's car), European Minardi Junior, 1m39.539s
Ananda Mikola, Astromega, 1m39.737s
Giorgio Pantano, Astromega, 1m39.849s
Nicolas Filliberti, Prost Junior Team, 1m39.877s
Christian Murchison, Fortec, 1m40.298s
Gabriele Varano, Prost Junior Team, 1m40.410s
Joel Camathias, KTR, 1m40.468s

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