The lubridate package is great for this sort of stuff.
> wday(as.Date('16-08-2012','%d-%m-%Y'))
[1] 5
> wday(as.Date('16-08-2012','%d-%m-%Y'), label=TRUE)
[1] Thurs
Levels: Sun < Mon < Tues < Wed < Thurs < Fri < Sat
> wday(as.Date('16-08-2012','%d-%m-%Y'), label=TRUE, abbr = FALSE)
[1] Thursday
Levels: Sunday < Monday < Tuesday < Wednesday < Thursday < Friday < Saturday
