Soaking Spa leaves fans frustrated

Rain played havoc with practice for the Belgian Grand Prix this afternoon to leave thousands of fans wet and dismayed.

Rain left the track damp for the morning session and saw only a limited number of laps from Formula One’s race drivers, with the Friday testers doing the leg work.

But matters got worse soon after lunch when the heavens opened to leave Spa-Francorchamps soaked by torrential rain – and thousands of fans staring at an empty track after only three cars left the pits.

Fans looked on frustrated as the first car out on track, Vitantonio Liuzzi, spun after only two corners on the sodden track.

The Italian’s Red Bull car snapped out of control when he hit the brakes for Les Combes, pitching him into two barriers and leaving his machine damaged. With Liuzzi battling Christian Klien for a race drive next season, the error could not have come at a worse time.

For the rest of the pitlane, Liuzzi’s accident served as a warning and when the session resumed all 25 drivers stayed in the warmth of the pit garages.

For the bumper Friday crowd, believed to be the biggest ever at Spa, there was no such shelter and with the prospect of no further running in the one-hour session, many streamed home to dry off.

At least the significant part of the crowd wearing Ferrari red had reason to be cheerful, with Michael Schumacher set to have his prayers answered.

The seven-time world champion admits he has no chance of victory this weekend unless the notoriously fickle Ardennes weather comes to his aid.

Schumacher is keeping his fingers crossed for more rain on Sunday afternoon to give him a chance of troubling the front-runners, saying: “I am praying for it.”

If the Belgian weather does not throw Ferrari a lifeline, Schumacher expects another difficult weekend as he seeks to avoid a third consecutive point-less race.

He added: “Just a few days after Monza, I cannot say I expect to see much improvement but I hope that there will be before the end of the season.

“The important thing and the reason we keep pushing is to put ourselves in the best possible position to be competitive again for next season.

“It will be tough but we know what it takes because we still have the same team of people who lost and had to push hard in 1997 and ’98 before becoming very strong and winning.”

Kimi Raikkonen set the fastest time in first practice, when a slightly damp track allowed significantly faster times.

The Finn’s set a best lap of one minute 48.206 seconds, with McLaren colleague Alex Wurz just 0.010secs slower.

Giancarlo Fisichella was the sole Renault representative in first practice, with team-mate Fernando Alonso sitting out the session to protect his engine.