Good day for Jaguar.

Jaguar Racing welcomed Pedro de la Rosa on board by posting one of its best free practice performances of the season in Barcelona today.

The Milton Keynes team completed a programme of tyre, aerodynamic and set-up changes to both its cars during today's two one-hour sessions for the Spanish Grand Prix, with Eddie Irvine taking second place behind David Coulthard and new race team member de la Rosa seventh.

"We basically went through our programme today and completed it successfully," Irvine reported, "Our main focus was choosing between the two Michelin tyres, and we completed the programme to our satisfaction. This is the first time that the team has really worked together on optimising both cars and I credit our new chief race engineer Mark Ellis. He only joined us in San Marino and his presence is certainly being felt for the better."

Barcelona marks the return of the infamous electronic aids to Formula One but, while several leading teams continue to report problems with their systems, Irvine confirmed that his day had been trouble-free.

"I know that many people suffered at the hands of traction control today, but we had no problems," he said, "It seems to be working very well for us, but it will be interesting to see how it manifests itself over a race distance. I wouldn't want anybody to read too much into our times today, but things have certainly improved at an operational level. I'm working well with Pedro, but it's too early to comment on his performance."

de la Rosa, too, admitted that he was still settling into the R2, despite some testing miles, and that his seventh place, while enjoyable, probably was not indicative of his true place in the pecking order.

"It was an interesting day for me," the Spaniard said, "I spent both sessions settling into the car and getting into the groove. We worked hard on set-up and tyre choice for tomorrow. The car improved a lot over the two sessions, but Fridays are never reflective of the real picture. Qualifying is what matters and that's what we will be judged on. I'm settling into my new role very well and I have a good team around me. There is obviously more work and development in progress, but this is a pleasing start to my role at Jaguar Racing."

The team also does not expect to be placed so highly at the conclusion of tomorrow's qualifying session, although it was satisfied with the tasks it completed today.

"The team did a comprehensive job today, and their application towards both cars was rewarded with a useful bank of data," commented CEO Bobby Rahal, "The Michelin compounds are very good here and we are pleased with the choices available to us. The team also benefited from good set-up work, but we will not be drawing too many conclusions from the positions. We successfully completed our job list for today and I was pleased to see that our traction control system is performing ok. We've got to go quicker tomorrow and we'll be working hard in an effort to achieve this. We certainly need to make changes for the better, but this isn't a bad start to our Spanish Grand Prix weekend."

Qualifying takes place tomorrow afternoon [Saturday].