Alonso not impressed with first look at Schumacher’s new Ferrari

WORLD championship leader Fernando Alonso was unconcerned by the performance of Ferrari’s new F2005 machine after its debut on the first day of practice for the Bahrain Grand Prix yesterday.

Ferrari, the reigning world champions, fast-tracked their new car onto the grid for this weekend’s event after making a disappointing start to the season with a modified version of their old F2004 machine.

But Michael Schumacher finished fifth fastest in preparation for Sunday’s race and Alonso, whose Renault team have dominated the season so far with victory in the first two races, was not impressed.

“I didn’t see a very dominating car there from Ferrari and this is good for us,” said Alonso. “It’s not really a good day to have clear information about that, but I think they are similar to the first two races.”

Alonso won the last race, in Malaysia, to move into an early lead in the title race as Schumacher claimed his first points of the season with a disappointing seventh-place finish.

Ferrari have faltered so far this season after dominating the sport and winning every constructors world championship since 1999 with Schumacher winning all of the drivers’ titles this decade.

But Alonso admitted that while Ferrari and McLaren, who had also been expected to challenge for the championship this season, have so far failed to shine they will return to form and offer Renault a strong challenge.

“When I arrived in Australia for the first race I was pretty sure that Ferrari and McLaren were our big rivals,” said Alonso.

“Now I still think they are the big teams this year and at the end of the championship they will be there.”

In the meantime, Austrian Alex Wurz topped the times for McLaren on the first day of practice for the Bahrain race as Ferrari failed to find the pace with their newly introduced F2005 machine here.

Michael Schumacher had showed a glimpse of the new car’s potential when he finished second behind Brazilian Toyota test driver Ricardo Zonta in the first practice session earlier Friday.

But the world champion appeared to be struggling with his new machine after only one day of previous testing and finished the second session down in fifth place after locking his brakes on several laps.

Schumacher remained confident, however, and when asked of his chances compared to racing the old F2004 he said: “(They are) better than before. I am very happy with the car, I did not have any problems and we are in a good way.”

Wurz, who was drafted in to the Friday sessions as a replacement for regular test driver Pedro de la Rosa when the Spaniard moved into the race seat to replace injured Colombian Juan Pablo Montoya, set a time of 1:30.695.

He finished 1.274 seconds ahead of closest challenger, Alonso and 1.624 seconds ahead of Italian Vitantonio Liuzzi’s Red Bull Racing car.

Pedro De la Rosa put his McLaren into fourth place ahead of Schumacher with Italian Jarno Trulli, who finished the last race second for Toyota, down in sixth almost two seconds off the lead.

Italian Giancarlo Fisichella, the winner of the season-opening race in Australia, finished seventh fastest for Renault with Finn Kimi Raikkonen eight in the third McLaren.

Briton Jenson Button, of BAR-Honda, finished ninth fastest while Ralf Schumacher made it two Toyota cars in the top ten.