Car setup and mistakes for Toyota at Imola on Fri

Difficult day
By Huw Alban (18/04/03)
April 20 2003

The team's official post Friday press release summarises a very difficult day for the team. Olivier Panis struggled to find a good balance for his TF103, whilst da Matta hopes to make up for some silly mistakes on Saturday.

Olivier Panis took a stab in the dark for his first qualifying run, and the gamble paid off with the Frenchman lining up 12th. Cristiano da Matta tried hard, but 2 small mistakes cost him a lot of time pushing him way down the order to 18th.

Panis explaines: "We had a few set-up problems in morning practice and I couldn't really find the right amount of grip. There were also a couple of issues with the brakes. For qualifying I took a bit of a risk on the set-up and it's better, although still not quite where we want to be, which is inside the top 10."

Da Matta' assessment was rather more straightforward: "There is not a lot to say except that I made a mistake in the first sector when I had a moment on the exit of the Tamburello Chicane, which cost me the best part of two seconds compared to the quickest time in sector one. I got on the radio immediately and apologised to the team and that's the end of the story. Hopefully tomorrow, when it really matters, will be different."

Team Principal Ove Andersson was not unhappy with the final Friday result. "Considering the morning performance when we struggled a lot, I think we should be quite pleased with the first qualifying result. We have found a good way of setting up the car, so we hope to continue in this productive way tomorrow morning."