Lister sets early pace at Brno.

Brno has often brought out the best in Lister, no less than in 2002 when Jamie Campbell-Walter and Nicolaus Springer took the win after an hour-long nose-to-tail battle, and the 2003 edition looks to be another good one for the British team after it dominated free practice at the Czech venue.

The #14 car of Campbell-Walter and Nathan Kinch was carrying 30kg of ballast weight after the opening three races of the year, but still managed to top both sessions at the Masaryk circuit. Temperatures started off cool, but the weather remained good, with a just a light breeze to cause the engineers to scratch their heads. As a result, times from both sessions remained fairly static, even though the order behind the Lister changed constantly.

The first free practice session was dominated by the #14 and #15 Lister Storms, with Campbell-Walter and Andrea Piccini the only drivers to go beneath the two-minute barrier during the 90 minute session. Campbell-Walter emerged fastest, with a time of 1min 59.339secs set early on, while his Italian team-mate improved an hour into the session, lapping just 0.450secds slower.

Third fastest was the #5 Force One Festina Chrysler Viper GTS-R of Mike Hezemans and Anthony Kumpen, with the #22 BMS Scuderia Italia car setting the fourth best time, just one-hundredth of a second faster than the Creation Autosportif Lister. It was a morale boosting run for the Ferrari crew, which had heard just 24 hours that it was not to get its Enna win re-instated under appeal to the FIA.

"Everything is going well, and this track is good for all our cars," Fabrizio Gollin said, "We have been testing a lot of different things, and I think we will do well in
qualifying tomorrow. Last year I was leading here, in the Chrysler Viper, until I had a fuel pressure problem on the last lap and dropped to third. I really hope that I don't have any more bad luck and that Luca and I can win the race."

Despite only completing one flying lap, Jean-Marc Gounon's time of 2min 00.959secs placed the Konrad Motorsport Saleen S7-R seventh fastest, only 1.6secs behind the leader.

"I only did one flying lap in the morning, so I think my time was excellent," the Frenchman said, "I am really pleased; we spent the session working on the set-up and this afternoon we will have to see how it goes. But I'm already quite happy with the progress."

As in GT, the 2002 winner proved fastest in N-GT, with the #50 Freisinger Motorsport Porsche of Ortelli and Lieb setting the best time, 2min 04.530secs, ahead of local hero Tomas Enge in the #57 MENX Ferrari 360 Modena.

The #52 JMB Racing Ferrari 360 Modena, of N-GT Championship leaders Andrea Bertolini and Fabrizio de Simone, was third, with the #89 Team Maranello Concessionaires Ferrari of Darren Turner and Kelvin Burt fourth.

The Pergusa winning #61 EMKA Racing Porsche 996 GT3-RS failed to complete a lap, however, succumbing to an early engine failure and having to change the unit before second practice.

The second 90-minute session was dominated once more by the #14 Lister Storm, with Campbell-Walter improving on his morning time, and setting the fastest lap of the day with a time of 1min 58.800secs. However, the Englishman was closely followed by Gounon's #2 Konrad Saleen, which lapped just three-tenths of a second behind him.

"This is a good track for us, with lots of corners, short straights and the car is really good," JC-W admitted, "We used one set of tyres per session, and we were quick in both. The rest of the time we were just concentrating on the race set-up. We lost a lot of time in the race in Enna-Pergusa, so we want to choose the right set of tyres for the race.

"I am confident the car is good for qualifying, for pole or front row, but I am more worried about the race. It will be long and hot, but we really want to get back to our winning ways, and I think this is a good place to do it."

The championship-leading #23 BMS Scuderia Italia Ferrari 550 Maranello of Matteo Bobbi and Thomas Biagi was third fastest, despite carrying 100kg penalty weight after three straight wins, and, with the #5 Force One Chrysler Viper improving to fourth in the late stages of the session, this meant four different cars in the top four places in GT.

"I am very happy to be in the top three with 100kg penalty weight," points leader Bobbi admitted, "It's my first time here, which makes me even happier with the results. I think qualifying will be quite difficult, as the Lister cars are very fast, but I am confident for the race. The circuit is really nice, I love it - it reminds me of Mugello, with up and down sections, and quite fast."

"That was a decent time!" Anthony Kumpen said of his afternoon lap in the #5 car, "The car is good, and we have some good tyres for this track, another new tyre from Pirelli that we have never used before. Everything is working very well and I think we can have a good time. Last year, we had a lead of over a minute when we stopped, and I had pole the year before that - we're always quick here, although it's not really a Viper track. But the car feels really good, our set-up is already good, and I think we can do well."

The #15 Lister of Piccini and Jean-Denis Deletraz was fifth, with the #7 Graham Nash Saleen of Thomas Erdos and Mike Newton improving to sixth.

"This morning went well, although I was still not faster than Jamie, but in the afternoon we had a problem with the floor of the car, and could only do a few laps on old tyres," Piccini revealed, "We have a good set-up, but we are still missing some speed compared to Jamie."

In N-GT, the #88 Team Maranello Ferrari 360 Modena set the best time with a lap of 2min 04.691secs, with the team's second car slotting into second place. However, the time set by Jamie Davies was a tenth of a second slower than the best time set by the #50 Freisinger Porsche in the morning, and the Porsche set the third best time in the afternoon to keep the pressure on.

"We tried something different this morning, which didn't work," Davies said of the TMC team's move to the front, "In the afternoon, we went back to the standard set-up and it was much better, so at least we are in the ball park. I am fairly happy with the car. This is my first time at the circuit, which is good fun. It's a nice area, with a good layout."

The #52 JMB Racing Ferrari 360 Modena was fourth, with the #61 EMKA Racing setting the fifth time after its engine change. The brand new nr 69 Proton Competition Porsche 996 GT3-RS set its first competitive time after a problem in the earlier session, with a lap of 2min 12.789secs, ahead of the #54 Cirtek Motorsport car of Mark Mayall and Ian Khan, which arrived late and was scrutineered early in the afternoon.

The JMB Racing Ferrari 550 Maranello cars had a difficult start to the weekend, with both suffering engine problems and two changes needed before tomorrow's qualifying session.

With the father and son Proton Competition team moving to N-GT with the brand new #69 Porsche 996 GT3-RS, the team's venerable Porsche 911 GT2 is being driven by Italian GT regulars, Mauro Casadei and Moreno Soli, along with Maciez Marcinkiewicz, who drove for Alda Motorsport at Brno last year.

"The car is going well, we just need more laps to get used to it," Christian Ried said of the new N-GT machine, "The car is completely different from the Porsche 911 GT2 - less power, but with much better set-up in the corners. This weekend we are concentrating on getting some laps in, to get used to it, and then for Donington we hope to be competitive. It was our best race last year, in the GT2 car, so we hope to finish in the points again."