French Grand Prix – Qualifying Round-Up
WHAT A FRANCE FORMATION
Panasonic Toyota Racing will line up with two drivers in
the top five of the grid for tomorrow's French Grand Prix
after today's hour of qualifying at Magny-Cours. On a hot
and sunny day at the Circuit de Nevers the track temperature
exceeded 50 degrees Celsius and Toyota displayed suitably
scorching pace. Both drivers showed the potential of the TF106B
in Q1, with Jarno Trulli fastest of all and Ralf Schumacher
just behind with the third quickest time. That pattern continued
into Q2, with Ralf securing the second best lap and Jarno
6th. In Q3, which has been shortened from this race onwards
to 15 minutes from 20 minutes, both drivers had clear final
laps with Jarno taking 4th place and Ralf 5th. Toyota will
now look to make the most of its best qualifying performance
of 2006 in tomorrow's race.
Jarno Trulli (Car 8, Chassis TF106/08B)
PROVISIONAL GRID: 4th
Free Practice Session 3: 3rd, 18 laps
Lap Time: 1m17.056s (+0.051s)
Q1: 1st, 6 laps
Lap Time: 1m15.550s (Fastest)
Q2: 6th, 3 laps
Lap Time: 1m15.776s (+0.665s)
Q3: 4th, 12 laps
Lap Time: 1m16.036s (+0.543s)
"In the last few months the team has been working really
hard and by consequence we have a good car at the moment.
We have been quick all weekend and I'm pleased to be 4th here
so thanks to all the Toyota team. It looks like the tyres
are very competitive as well so thanks to Bridgestone which
is also doing a very good job. The change from 20 minutes
to 15 minutes in Q3 doesn't really affect anything for the
driver, it just means a bit less time for burning fuel. I
made a few mistakes on my fastest lap so I probably could
have done better. But we have a strong package and everything
has gone well here so far so I just hope for another good
race tomorrow."
Ralf Schumacher (Car 7, Chassis TF106/09B)
PROVISIONAL GRID: 5th
Free Practice Session 3: 9th, 18 laps
Lap Time: 1m17.666s (+0.661s)
Q1: 3rd, 6 laps
Lap Time: 1m15.949s (+0.399s)
Q2: 2nd, 3 laps
Lap Time: 1m15.625s (+0.514s)
Q3: 5th, 12 laps
Lap Time: 1m16.091s (+0.598s)
"The whole weekend we have shown that the car has been
performing well and up to speed, so it has been a good two
days for us. I'm sure that Bridgestone again has the upper
hand on the tyre front but as a team we have also done a good
job. My sessions went pretty smoothly today. I lost a bit
of time on my first lap in Q1 due to traffic but the second
lap was clear. Q2 went better and I was able to post the second
quickest time. My last lap in Q3 was also pretty pain-free
and considering the strategy that we have we can be quite
satisfied. We are confident about our race pace so now let's
see what we can achieve tomorrow."
Pascal Vasselon – Senior General Manager Chassis
"It's obviously very satisfying to record our best qualifying
performance of the season so that was a good day's work. When
we introduced the TF106B in Monaco we announced that it would
provide the platform for regular aerodynamic upgrades. Since
then we have adapted our aero package at every race and now
we are reaping the rewards. The whole weekend has actually
gone very smoothly so far because our performance has been
very consistent in all the practice sessions. So we already
knew yesterday that we had a good chance to perform well and
this is where we expected to be on the grid. This morning's
practice session went well and as usual we stayed on used
tyres to assess the race performance. In qualifying we had
no major issues with traffic and both drivers put in good
laps. We are also very happy with our Bridgestone tyres, which
are consistent and also showed this afternoon that they have
good first lap pace. So far so good, then, and now we can
look forward to what will be an interesting race tomorrow."
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