Spanish Grand Prix – Free Practice Round-Up
SPANISH STEPS
Panasonic Toyota Racing today began its preparations for
Sunday's Spanish Grand Prix on the outskirts of the city of
Barcelona. All the drivers know the Circuit de Catalunya better
than any other track after hours and hours of pounding round
during tests in all conditions throughout the year. The rain
in Spain fell mainly in the morning today, meaning the first
practice session began on a damp track and most drivers opted
to remain in the garage. Jarno Trulli and Ralf Schumacher
both had busier afternoons, successfully completing their
programmes of tyre comparison and set-up fine-tuning with
over 50 laps between them. They will now look to continue
that progress as Toyota seeks a strong result on Sunday. This
weekend's event is a sell-out, with 330,000 people expected
to attend over the course of the three days.
Ralf Schumacher (Car 7, Chassis TF106/05)
First Session Classification: 17th, 1 lap completed
No lap time
Second Session Classification: 10th, 25 laps completed
Lap Time: 1m17.506s (+0.973s)
"Today was a pretty painless start to the weekend. The
car felt okay, we had no problems and we made it through our
tyre programme. I haven't had many good results in Barcelona
in the past, but I do like the track. It is a difficult circuit
to drive and a very good test for car performance. Our car
is well balanced and we have good race pace so we will hope
to perform well over the rest of the weekend. The whole team
has high expectations but we could certainly do with some
points for both the drivers' and the constructors' championships.
We narrowly missed out last week and we have to keep pushing
for more on Sunday."
Jarno Trulli (Car 8, Chassis TF106/04)
First Session Classification: 13th, 1 lap completed
No lap time
Second Session Classification: 11th, 30 laps completed
Lap Time: 1m17.610s (+1.077s)
"I struggled for performance during the race at the
European Grand Prix last week but now we have understood what
happened and found some issues we had with the set-up. So
we hope to avoid a repeat of the problem and I'm sure that
we can do better here. We were quite competitive at the last
test that we had at this circuit. The conditions are likely
to be different this weekend but nevertheless I am confident.
Today was a normal Friday of tyre comparisons. We had some
graining so we still have a bit of work to do. But if everything
goes well during the weekend then I'm sure that we can claim
a good result. I've made the podium here in the last two years
so I'm definitely confident heading into Sunday."
Dieter Gass – Chief Engineer Race and Test
"Overall that was a positive Friday for us. We made it
through a lot of work and we had no problems with our cars
which ran reliably throughout. It was pointless to do any
running in the first session because the early shower left
the track too green so we just did installation laps. The
track was still slippery at the start of the second session
but it improved a lot as the hour went on. We had a busy time
with both drivers, collecting some valuable information on
our tyres. That means we have all the data we need for the
choice tomorrow. There is still work to be done on the set-up
but this is a good starting point for the weekend."
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