Turkish Grand Prix - Free Practice Round-Up
RETURN OF THE PRODIGAL SUN
After the unusually cold and wet weather at the Hungaroring
earlier in the month, the first day of practice for the Turkish
Grand Prix marked a return to normality for the F1 teams.
Under sunny skies at the Istanbul Park circuit, Panasonic
Toyota Racing began its preparations for Sunday's race with
two solid sessions of practice work. Toyota's race drivers
Ralf Schumacher and Jarno Trulli recorded the 5th and 15th
fastest times of the afternoon respectively. Track temperatures
exceeded 50 degrees Celsius and more of the same is expected
for the rest of the weekend. Now the team will use the data
it has collected to make its tyre choice for qualifying and
the race.
Ralf Schumacher (Car 7, Chassis TF106/10B)
First Session Classification: 20th, 5 laps completed
No lap time
Second Session Classification: 5th, 21 laps completed
Lap Time: 1m28.614s (+0.523s)
"Turkey is a very nice country and we have again been
well received in Istanbul. There is lots of interest in F1
around the city so it is a good place to come to race. Today
we made it through our programme of tyre and set-up work as
we hoped so that was a painless day. The car felt good today
too so we should be reasonably happy with that. With this
year's cars Turn 8 is a little easier than last year but it
is still a very fast corner. We were competitive at the last
few races before the August break and we have an improved
aerodynamic package here so we hope to show a strong performance
over the weekend."
Jarno Trulli (Car 8, Chassis TF106/08B)
First Session Classification: 21st, 2 laps completed
No lap time
Second Session Classification: 15th, 18 laps completed
Lap Time: 1m30.006s (+1.915s)
"It feels good to be back on track after our short August
break. Istanbul is a nice city and the facilities at the circuit
are outstanding so I enjoy coming here. After the cold and
wet conditions we saw in Budapest I'm glad to see it's hot
and sunny here. That should be good for us because our car
has always performed well in these conditions. Today showed
that we still have work to do on set-up, but we have quite
a few aerodynamic improvements this weekend so we expect to
edge closer to the pace of the top teams. We have been steadily
improving our performance so if we can stay reliable we can
hope for a good finish."
Dieter Gass – Chief Engineer Race and Test
"That was a positive Friday for us. We had no major issues
throughout the day and we were able to finish all the work
we had planned. We made it through our tyre programme and
we already have a pretty clear idea about which direction
we will take. Nevertheless we will check everything and go
through all the data again tonight. We have a new aerodynamic
package here, featuring a new front wing and a new floor.
The car was working well today so we will hope to take advantage
of that as the weekend progresses. At the moment it looks
like we are in good shape for the race."
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