The 'old man' of Formula One's young driver test in Jerez, Gary Paffett, led the way for McLaren at the end of the second day.

Aged 28 and in his fourth year as a McLaren test driver, Paffett made his experience count by setting the fastest lap of the week of one minute 18.718 secs for the 4.428km circuit in southern Spain.

Paffett finished almost half a second quicker than Nico Hulkenberg for Williams, the only driver in the field who has a race seat for next year as he will be partnering Rubens Barrichello at the Grove marque.

Hulkenberg was marginally slower than yesterday's pacesetter Andy Soucek, who was at the wheel of a Williams as his prize for winning this year's Formula Two championship.

British Formula Three champion Daniel Ricciardo furthered his cause in his bid to become Red Bull's test and reserve driver for next year with the third best time of the day, 0.526 secs off Paffett.

Paul di Resta produced another impressive performance for Force India, and is on course to land the team's reserve role for 2010.

The Scot was fourth quickest of the 12 on show, but crucially was just over 1.1 secs faster than American JR Hildebrand, who is sharing the driving duties with Di Resta over the three days.

The top four were head and shoulders above the rest, with Mexican Esteban Gutierrez nearly 0.8 secs behind di Resta.

It was still a fine performance from Gutierrez, who is just 18 and driving a Sauber as part of BMW's promise to their young drivers prior to their withdrawal from F1.

The Brawn GP duo of Briton Mike Conway and Marcus Ericsson from Sweden were just ahead of Hildebrand, followed by Jules Bianchi in a Ferrari.

Ferrari today confirmed the 20-year-old Frenchman, this year's Formula Three Euro Series champion, had signed a long-term deal with the team, albeit given an as yet undefined role.

Lucas di Grassi, in contention for a F1 seat for next year, and Ho-Pin Tung from China shared the duties for Renault and were 10th and 11th overall.

Mirko Bortolotti, last year's Italian Formula Three champion, finished at the bottom of the unofficial timesheets for Toro Rosso, three seconds adrift of Paffett.