San Marino Grand Prix - Free Practice Round-Up
Panasonic Toyota Racing today began its preparations for
the San Marino Grand Prix on a sunny day at Italy's Imola
circuit. Fresh from his podium in Australia, Ralf Schumacher
missed most of the day's running due to electronic problems
but Jarno Trulli successfully completed his programme of tyre
comparison and set-up work. The drivers will now look to make
continued improvements over the rest of the weekend as Toyota
bids for more points. Yesterday Toyota's Technical Director
Engine Luca Marmorini received the Gold Medal from the Italian
region of Emilio Romagna at the Lorenzo Bandini trophy evening.
Now the team will be looking for even more to cheer after
Sunday's race.
HIT'S A SET-UP
Jarno Trulli has high hopes for his home race after making
progress with his set-up during last week's test.
Jarno Trulli (Car 8, Chassis TF106/04)
First Session Classification: 5th, 7 laps completed
Lap Time: 1m26.417s (+1.666s)
Second Session Classification: 7th, 24 laps completed
Lap Time: 1m26.029s (+0.986s)
"I haven't had much fortune in the first three races,
but I am more confident about this weekend. At last week's
Barcelona test we took a different direction with set-up.
That led to a big step forward, and today the handling of
the car was pretty close to how I like it. We had to do more
laps than usual because of Ralf's problems but we look good
so far. We have some small steps on the car here and Bridgestone
have brought some new tyres so that should give us a chance
to get closer to the top teams. Historically Imola has never
been a good track for Toyota, but I'm confident we can turn
that record around."
MARINO PROBLEM
Ralf Schumacher missed most of the day due to electronic glitches
but he remains optimistic.
Ralf Schumacher (Car 7, Chassis TF106/05)
First Session Classification: 20th, 1 lap completed
No lap time
Second Session Classification: 22nd, 5 laps completed
Lap Time: 1m27.639s (+2.596s)
"Today was obviously not the perfect way to start the
weekend. But Jarno showed that we have good potential here
so I still have strong hopes. We saw in Melbourne that we
can now get much more out of our package. We've made further
improvements during testing so we hope to continue that progress
here. We are making steps forward but we are still behind
the top teams so we should aim for another strong finish in
the points. That would be a good result as we continue our
upward momentum."
MIXED KERBS
Panasonic Toyota Racing enjoyed ups and downs during practice
for Sunday's San Marino Grand Prix.
Dieter Gass - Chief Engineer Race and Test
"That was a day of mixed emotions for us. Some of the
Imola track has been resurfaced so the grip was lacking early
in the session but the modification to the Variante Alta is
good. We had a very positive day with Jarno, who was happy
with his car's balance. He was able to complete his programme
of set-up and tyre evaluation, even though he struggled with
traffic on his last run. Unfortunately we lost most of Ralf's
running because he had some electronic problems so we have
less data than usual for the tyre choice. We have an aero
update here and overall this was a promising start to the
weekend."
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