Barcelona: Narain Karthikeyan may have been struggling to keep pace with the other top drivers during testing sessions, but the fastest Indian was happy with the progress made by him and his team.

Karthikeyan and his Jordan teammate Tiago Monteiro of Portugal were in action for the third day of testing in mild and dry conditions in Barcelona, and completed 74 and 43 laps, respectively.

The 28-year-old clocked a best timing of 1:17.59 to finish three seconds behind the day?s fastest man, Pedro de la Rosa of McLaren.

?I did 74 laps today and we tried a lot of new things with the car, especially tyre work for Bridgestone,? Karthikeyan said. ?We also carried out some set-up changes and we are quite happy with the progress we have been making.?

The two drivers focussed on conducting tyre testing for Bridgestone and chassis set-up work in preparation for the Australian Grand Prix, to be held in Melbourne March 6, as well as practising pit stops.

Meanwhile, Austrian Christian Klien will partner David Coulthard at the Australian Grand Prix, Red Bull Racing said on Friday.

The 22-year-old, who raced for Jaguar in his debut season last year, has been battling it out with Italian F3000 champion Vitantonio Liuzzi for the second seat this year.

Liuzzi, also 22, will perform the third driver testing duties in Melbourne.

(PTI)