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After qualifying for the
United States Grand Prix it would be McLaren's David Coulthard who was
fastest of Michelin supplied drivers.
 David
had an engine change prior to qualifying and made good use of his fresh
Mercedes V10 to pip BMW WilliamsF1 driver Juan Pablo Montoya to third
place right at the end of the session. "It's nice to qualify well here at
Indianapolis and hopefully we should be able to perform in tomorrow's
race." said David. "Now we are aiming to maintain the pace in tomorrow's
race, where tyres will be play an important role."
Juan Pablo, won the Indianapolis 500 in 2000 and hopes to become the first
driver to win races on Indy's famous oval and the road course. He missed
out third position at the last moment by one thousandth of a second and
will therefore start from position four, in front of team mate Ralf
Schumacher. "Tomorrow
I am starting my race from the dirty side of the track and this is not
really helpful. But this is racing. Today we just could get a good
balance. I think at the moment we just haven't got the speed to beat
Ferrari." said the Colombian. Ralf Schumacher qualified fifth fastest. "It
is very difficult to find the right balance for the car here. I had
continuous set-up problems. The tyres were all right and I think they are
also looking quite good for tomorrow" said Ralf.
 McLaren's
Kimi Raikkonen posted the sixth fastest time. Kimi completed qualifying in
his T-car following an accident during this morning's free practice, which
saw the Finn going off the track and damaging the front suspension.
Renault's Jarno Trulli, who was eighth, lapped within half a second of
Coulthard and completed the list of five Michelin runners on the top ten.
Pierre Dupasquier, Michelin Motorsport Director, responded to various
questions.
Michelin has taken seven pole positions this season but did not make its
customary challenge for top spot today. How do you react to today's
qualifying session?
"It went pretty much as we expected, to be honest, although there were one
or two surprises. The margin between the two McLaren drivers is a little
bigger than usual, for instance, and Jaguar has fallen off the pace since
this morning for reasons that we have yet to ascertain. I have to
congratulate David Coulthard on his excellent run at the end of the
session because the track conditions didn't improve a great deal and most
of the best times were set early on, when it was cooler. His was a very
good lap."
Will we see both your harder, primary (A) tyre and the softer option (B)
in the race?
"No. The pattern today was the same as that we saw yesterday. One of our
two dry-weather compounds proved to be fast and consistent in equal
measure and all our partner teams have opted to use it in the race."
How do you feel about your prospects for the race?
"I am quietly optimistic. This year it has often been the case that race
results don't reflect what we have seen in qualifying and obviously I hope
that might happen again this weekend. Our tyres look to be in very good
shape for the race because they are very stable over long runs. We have no
concerns at all about durability."
This is traditionally a one-stop race. Have you seen anything to make you
think things might be different this season?
"You never know. Single-stop strategies have always been favoured here in
the past but simulations show it would not be an outrageous gamble to
attempt pitting twice." |
