FORMULA 1: On track yesterday, lead Jordan driver Giancarlo Fisichella posted the 14th fastest time of the day, some three and half seconds adrift of time sheet topper Kimi Raikkonen of McLaren Mercedes, writes Justin Hynes from Kuala Lumpar

Fisichella, though, was pleased with his first outings in the fearsome heat of the Sepang circuit.

"We did a good day's work today," said the Italian. "The car isn't perfect, but we have gathered a large amount of data to work on overnight, so I'm quite confident we can make some improvements for tomorrow. The main areas we need to improve are the oversteering into the entry of corners and some understeer mid-corner.

"The track was very slippery indeed and at the end of the session I picked up a lot of dirt which affected the lap times."

Two spots behind Fisichella was team-mate Takuma Sato, the Japanese driver making his Formula One debut at Sepang, having only toured the circuit in a Honda NSX sports car in the wake of his Formula 3 win in Macau last year.

"I'm very happy with how today went because the car worked without any problems at all, which meant I was able to complete 44 laps and really get to know the circuit well," he said.

"We decided to do long race simulation runs, which was good, not only for the car, but for me to test how physically demanding the race will be."

Meanwhile, Jaguar boss Niki Lauda said the team would only revert to last year's R2 Jaguar if it proved significantly quicker than the team's 2002 challenger.

Despite Eddie Irvine's fourth place and three-point finish in Australia, Jaguar bosses have been dismayed by the poor performance of the new R3 car and had suggested that the troubled team would revert to last year's R2 for the next race in Brazil in a fortnight. But Lauda said the team would only consider the move if the R2 proved much faster than the R3.

"The R2 only makes sense to us if it is between half a second and a second quicker than the R3 right away, and that's why we'll test next week," said the three-time former world champion. "If it's only a couple of tenths then we can get the R3 working quickly."

That will come as scant consolation to Eddie Irvine, who has to pilot the recalcitrant R3 in Malaysia and could do no better than 20th in free practice. "Given that we couldn't do any work on the cars between here and Melbourne, we are obviously handicapped by the same problem of downforce deficiency," he said.

"We have a similar test plan for Saturday morning's warm-up sessions, and once qualifying is over, we'll be far better placed to draw conclusions about the various revisions we've made to the package, albeit minor ones."

The Irishman could find himself between a rock and a hard place if those revisions don't produce significant improvements however. Last year's R2 netted Irvine just six points and failed to make the finish line on 11 of the 17 races.

The R2 was fitted with electronic power steering, which has since been outlawed by the FIAl. It could be replaced with a mechanical system but it is a development that would cost time and money.

Happier with their progress were McLaren, with young Finn Kimi Raikkonen setting the day's fastest time and team-mate David Coulthard backing him up to push Michael Schumacher out to third.

"It's nice to be fastest but it's too early to say how we'll do tomorrow," said Raikkonen, who added: "Let's wait and see where we are in qualifying."

Where Raikkonen and Coulthard are likely to be is behind Schumacher. The German, who had been comfortably quickest in the morning session, spent most of the afternoon working on a long race simulation under heavy fuel loads and, with the sniff of light fuel suspicion about Raikkonen and Coullthard's afternoon times, Schumacher still remains favourite for pole position and the race.

FIRST PRACTICE TIMES: 1 K Raikkonen (Fin, McLaren) One minute 37.399 Seconds, 2 D Coulthard (Brit, McLaren) at 0.639 secs, 3 M Schumacher (Ger, Ferrari) at 1.091, 4 R Schumacher (Ger, Williams) at 1.251, 5 M Salo (Fin, Toyota) at 1.667, 6 J P Montoya (Col, Williams) at 1.759. OTHER TIMES: 14 G Fisichella (Ita, Jordan) at 3.416 16 T Sato (Jap, Jordan) at 3.712. 20 E Irvine (Ire, Jaguar) at 4.458.