European Grand Prix - Preview
HOMEWARD BOUND
Panasonic Toyota Racing is on home ground this weekend for
the European Grand Prix at the Nürburgring, which is
located only around an hour’s drive away from the team’s
factory in Cologne, Germany. The team is determined to reward
its home fans with more points after another promising, but
ultimately frustrating, race weekend at Silverstone. Ralf
Schumacher showed the potential of the TF107 by qualifying
a season-best sixth but neither he nor team-mate Jarno Trulli
finished the race. After the high-speed corners of Magny-Cours
and Silverstone, the Nürburgring represents a return
to medium downforce specification. As with most races this
season, the team brings an upgraded car to the Nürburgring,
with small aerodynamic improvements since the British Grand
Prix. Jarno celebrated his 33rd birthday on 13 July with a
visit to the factory to give his technical input prior to
this weekend’s race, when the team aims to return to
the points.
Ralf Schumacher (Car 11): “The Nürburgring
is not only the home track for the team but also for me because
I was born and grew up quite close by. I have always really
enjoyed racing there because I get a lot of support from my
home fans and I also have good memories of winning my first
Formula Junior race there, and of course winning the European
Grand Prix in 2003 which was a very special moment. I hope
to have another good result to celebrate this weekend and
I am confident we are making progress, even though the result
at Silverstone was disappointing. On the positive side, you
could see from my sixth place in qualifying and my lap times
during the race that our car has improved and we are able
to compete higher up the grid. The team is pushing hard to
continue this improvement and it would be great to see the
results of that work with a points finish at one of our home
tracks this weekend.”
Jarno Trulli (Car 12): “Silverstone
was a weekend to forget to be honest. We had a good opportunity
to score points because the car was quick, as you can see
from Ralf’s great performance in qualifying. It was
a shame that on my car I had no grip and was sliding a lot
in the race. Formula 1 is about many little things so we have
analysed the data from Silverstone and we will work on improving
the set-up when practice starts on Friday. I am still optimistic
for this weekend because I think the car definitely has potential
and everyone is working very hard to get the best out of it.
I know the Nürburgring circuit very well, not just from
my 10 years in Formula 1 but also from my time in German Formula
3. The most important thing at this track is to find a good
rhythm because the corners come at you very quickly. This
is a home race for the team because our factory is based in
Cologne so I will be pushing to get a positive result for
everyone in the team.”
Pascal Vasselon – Senior General Manager Chassis:
“At Silverstone our level of performance was
good, the best so far this season. Obviously we struggled
to deliver a race result which corresponded to our level of
our performance and that was disappointing. We definitely
hope to show the same level of performance at the Nürburgring.
The track character is different because Silverstone is an
extreme track in terms of tyre severity and average cornering
speed. Nürburgring is more average in all aspects - in
terms of downforce, as we will run medium downforce, in terms
of braking stability and tyre usage. You have a bit of everything
- you can be traction limited and front end limited. It is
an average track but it doesn’t mean that average is
not interesting - it’s a challenging track but without
the special character of Silverstone for example. It’s
always nice to have our home race, we can feel the pressure
and encouragement from our supporters in the grandstands and
this is an additional motivation for the race team. Our goal
for this weekend has to be to score points and see our drivers
fight for the top six again.”
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