Tyre management will remain crucial

Felipe Massa (Ferrari) used Bridgestone’s super soft compound Potenza Formula One tyre to set a time of 1min 11.931secs for pole position at Interlagos for this weekend’s Brazilian Grand Prix.

Massa beat Lewis Hamilton (McLaren Mercedes) to first place on the grid for tomorrow’s race by just 15 hundredths of a second. Hamilton is therefore first of the three championship title contenders on the grid for tomorrow’s race. All drivers on the grid used the super soft compound for their fastest lap.

The second row tomorrow consists of further title rivals Kimi Raikkonen (Ferrari) and Fernando Alonso (McLaren Mercedes), with Raikkonen the faster of the two. The day’s fastest lap, a 1min 11.810secs, was set in the morning practice session by Massa.

In contrast to the first day of running in Brazil, temperatures soared today with blue skies and no threat of rain. Track temperatures were amongst the highest experienced this season, with high ambient temperatures and the dark new track surface attracting the heat.

Hirohide Hamashima - Director of Bridgestone Motorsport Tyre Development, said:
“Congratulations to Felipe Massa for achieving his second consecutive pole position on home ground. Today the ambient and track temperatures were higher as we had expected and the new track surface is still rubbering in. In FP3 some competitors experienced difficulties with the super soft compound because of these factors, and as a result suffered from oversteer after a limited number of laps. In qualifying this situation had improved and Massa was very quick on his pole lap. Between the two compounds there was an average difference of 0.4 seconds, with the super soft quicker. We saw heavy graining and degradation on the super soft today. However, the circuit should improve very quickly in the race tomorrow, but tyre management will remain crucial.”

Stats of the Day 
Total amount of laps completed by all drivers: 749 laps 
Average number of laps per car: 34 laps 
Most laps by a driver: 49 laps – Nick Heidfeld 
Fastest lap: 1m 11.810s – Massa in FP3 
Compounds: Soft and super soft 

Brazilian Grand Prix in 2006
Felipe Massa (Ferrari) won the last Brazilian Grand Prix
by 18.6 seconds from Fernando Alonso (Renault), who 
clinched his second world championship title. Jenson 
Button (Honda) finished in third..  

Temperatures     Ambient     Track       Weather 
Practice – AM    25C-27C     36C-42C     Sunny 
Qualifying – PM  30C-33C     47C-49C-48C Sunny