WILL Stevens underlined his potential as a genuine contender for the Formula Renault title with a terrific testing display at Brands Hatch.

The Manor Competition driver kicked off pre-season in style with a time of 42.968 seconds, the only racer to go below the 43-second mark on the Indy circuit.

That placed him two 10ths of a second clear of his closest rival on the day, ending the first officially timed outing of 2010 as the fastest driver of all on combined times, 0.123 seconds ahead of team-mate Lewis Williamson.

The two Manor drivers were also the only two drivers to lap with an average speed of more than 100mph.

Manor's Tony Shaw said: "It's been a great start for us, it was fantastic to have Lewis on top of the times on Tuesday and then Will on top [on Wednesday].

"There's a lot to learn with the new car but the team is working so hard and doing an unbelievable job. We've got a first class team of people at Manor but we're not getting carried away, there's a huge amount of hard work ahead."

Meanwhile Stevens has been named one of 10 drivers to be selected for the Motor Sports Association's Team UK national squad.

Team UK represents the pinnacle of the MSA Academy structure created last year under the direction of MSA Performance Director Robert Reid to guide young drivers from eight-years-old through to world championship level. The new Team UK designation reflects the creation of a national squad of the country's most promising drivers and builds on the experience gained from the previous Elite schemes in Rally and Race over the past five and three years respectively.