The second day of official FIA World Touring Car Championship testing got underway at the Monza circuit in Italy this morning, and in complete contrast to yesterday’s wet and windy conditions the track is dry. The times set in the first session (the fourth of six scheduled over the two days) were almost immediately around ten seconds faster than previous sessions yesterday, and the top ten drivers were all within one second of each other.

Again though it was the N.technology-run  Alfa Romeo 156 racers that once more set the testing pace, building on yesterday when Augusto Farfus posted fastest time in all three sessions and all three Alfa Romeo drivers were in the overall top four times of the day. This morning it was the turn of Farfus' team mate, Italian touring car star Salvatore Tavano, to set the fastest time of 2:01.173, but only after a tough track battle with the Brazilian team leader whose 2:01.237 fastest lap was good enough for second place. The third official Alfa Romeo driver, former F1 driver Gianni Morbidelli, who like Tavano has just joined the team, achieved the 7th quickest overall time.

Tom Coronel for the GR Asia team made his first appearance at the test session in impressive fashion by setting the third best lap overall time in the morning session at the wheel of the team’s bright orange SEAT Toledo. It was Peter Terting who was the fastest of the factory SEAT Sport team drivers, 5th overall. Former Alfa Romeo factory driver Gabriele Tarquini, who has switched to the SEAT squad this year, however did not take part in today's first session due to illness. The official BMW teams were headed by reigning champion Andy Priaulx who was 0.313 of a second off Tavano’s fastest lap time.
 

Dirk and Jörg Müller were 6th and 10th respectively while Marcel Costa, the young Spaniard, set an impressive 2:01.895 which positioned him as the third fastest BMW and in 8th place overall. Alain Menu and Robert Huff in the official Chevrolets occupied 13th and 14th places respectively while their team-mate Nicola Larini was in 22nd place.

Monza will also play host to the first two races of the 2006 FIA World Touring Car Championshipin in just ten days time (1-2 April), so this week's two day official test is providing the teams with an invaluable opportunity to prepare for the upcoming event. The FIA WTCC series will then move on to Magny-Cours in France (29-30 April) before it visits Brands Hatch in (20-21 May), which has taken over the English calendar date from Silverstone. A trip to Oschersleben in Germany (3-4 June) rounds out the first stage of European action with the teams then travelling to South America, firstly to a brand-new fixture at Curitiba in Brazil (1-2 July) and then to Puebla-Amozoc in Mexico, which they visit for the second time (29-30 July). Then after a month-long mid-summer break its on to the historic Brno track in the Czech Republic (2-3 September), after which Istanbul in Turkey (23-24 September) and Valencia, Spain (7-8 October) are contested before the teams head to the Far East for the final two rounds at Macao (17-19 November).