In Friday’s second free practice session at the Red Bull Ring, conditions were much better for the drivers than in the morning stint. The track had dried up and temperatures were a little higher.

When the lights went on green, there was lots of action in the pits, as several competitors had not yet hit the tarmac due to earlier technical issues.

In the OPEN Class Ingo Gerstl finally got his Toro Rosso car going, but it was another home fans hero who topped the standings. Bernd Herndlhofer pushed his Benetton B197 to a mighty 1:17,532 minutes outpacing the rest of the field. Unfortunately, he had to retire his car shortly before practice time had elapsed causing a red flag.

Championship leader Klaas Zwart was still battling problems with his newly set up car, but jumped to P2 in the dying seconds, just ahead of Gerstl. Peter Milavec, who had led the pack after FP1, finished fourth.

Czech female driver Veronica Cicha made her debut in a Formula One car, chasing good lap times in a Super Aguri SA06.

In the FORMULA class, Christopher Brenier continued to dominate, underlining that he wants victory on Saturday.

“What a great day for me. I hope my streak will hold tomorrow”,

he was all smiles.

Salvatore de Plano made up for times past in the morning and came runner-up, ahead of two Frenchmen, Gilles Brenier and Philippe Haezebrouck. De Plano and Haezebrouck agreed that

“the Breniers are very strong here. But we will do our best to defeat them.”

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