Kimi Raikkonen's attempt to close the gap on supposed championship rival Michael Schumacher was dealt an early blow in Bahrain, when another engine problem caused him to♏ lose valuable track time - and ten grid positions.

Although qualifying is not for another 24 hours, the problem was sufficient for McLaren and Mercedes to admit to needing to change the engine - an act that, this season, carries an autom𒆙atic teꦫn-place starting penalty.

"Kimi's engine stopped after a fire in the air tray caused by a fuel lea🦄k," Mercedes' Norbert Haug revealed, "The damage to the engine was severe enough that we need to change i𝓡t."

Having been guilty of venting his Malaysian༺ frustration on a track worker, Raikkonen's 'officia💛l' post-race comments were quite restrained.

"I'm obviously di♈sappointed to lose almost all of the second practice session due to an engine failure," he sighed, "All of a sudden, I just lost all power. It's a shame as I was going to go for it, as I had used the first session to familiarise myself with the track."

Team-mate David Coulthard did not have an easy second session, either, and , having placed sixth overall in the opening hour of action at the new Bahr𝓰ain International Circui⛦t, dropped to eleventh after lunch when he suffered a left rear tyre failure.

"Obviously, this is not the best start to the weekend," the Scot sa🌳id frustratedly, "The failure caused me to go off the track, and we are looking into why at the moment, as it can be a numbe🀅r of factors."

Team bo𒐪ss Ron Dennis was succinct in his summation.

"A ve🎐ry disruptive first day for both drivers," he admiﷺtted, "However, as always, we were concentrating on optimising our race pace, which at this stage doesn't look too bad."

Schumacher, with whom Raikkonen was tipped to be battling for the title, topped the times in session one, before ceding the advantཧage to Ferrari team-mate Rubens Barrichꦍello.