Mud, inglorious mud. The folly of shifting the British Grand Prix from its traditional July date to this sodden Easter weekend was cruelly exposed yesterday by the sight of David Coulthard's stranded McLaren being fished from the edge of the track by one of the FIA's recovery vehicles.

All well and good, except that not even the four-wheel driven recovery vehicle could negotiate Silverstone's conditions, its wheels slipping and sliding as the afternoon practice session was red flagged and Coulthard helped officials manhandle his car back on track. Meanwhile in all the chaos, Heinz-Harald Frentzen marked Jordan's 150th race by clocking the fastest time. The German finished half-a-second ahead of the rest of the field, though he set the time before the hour-long session was rendered meaningless by rain with about 25 minutes left.

Frentzen was followed by Eddie Irvine though there was more disappointment for his fellow Jaguar Racing driver Johnny Herbert who stopped early on.

Coulthard was third fastest followed by McLaren team-mate Mika Hakkinen with Jarno Trulli fifth in the other Jordan.

Ferrari's Michael Schumacher, who leads the championship by 21 points, was way down in 20th spot although that was no indication about his likely competitiveness in tomorrow's 60-lap race.

The drivers took the opportunity to test out their wet-weather tyres, but if conditions are repeated today then qualifying could become a lottery.

On Thursday, drivers and team owners alike questioned the decision of ripping the grand prix untimely from the warm womb of its mid-summer date. But, some suggest, the continuing row over just where and when the British Grand Prix will be held in the future led to the FIA slapping wrists at Silverstone and at Brands Hatch Leisure, the company which at once stage had signed a lucrative contract (to Bernie Ecclestone at least ) to stage the race at the Kent circuit from 2002.

Remedial works at Brands were, however, unfeasible by that date and after a bid by BHL boss Nicola Foulston to buy Silverstone and simply employ the race licence there had failed, BHL was sold to American company Octagon and so the debacle continues. Coulthard's spin was only one of a dozen as the driver's struggled to cope with the hazardous conditions and afterwards the Scot admitted that the torrential rain had made the session almost impossible.

"I stopped before the really bad weather conditions, when I had the problem with the engine," he said. "I've been around Silverstone when we've had torrential rain before, like a couple of years ago, and it's not pleasant because even though the track's been resurfaced, there's still a lot of standing water and if you're not first visibility is terrible. From a driver's point of view it's very dangerous indeed."

Coulthard's team principal, Ron Dennis, was, however, quick to absolve the circuit of responsibility for the conditions.

"We have a Grand Prix season which last 32 weeks, which is a large part of the year and if you look at the climatic conditions that prevail over that 32 week period, I'm quite sure we could choose to go and race in Kuala Lumpur during a period when the weather would be appalling.