Team Rundown: Friday 2003 European GP

By FIA
June 27 2003

	Team Rundown - Friday Qualifying
	Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro: Michael Schumacher 2nd, Rubens Barrichello 5th. Ferrari was satisfied with the performance of the cars in first qualifying. Both cars ran in the dry and ended up in a good position for qualifying on Saturday. The only major incident of the day was when Rubens Barrichello knocked off his front wing on the bollard at the chicane during the morning session. "I was careful in the first sector on my qualifying lap," said Michael Schumacher. "After that I was on the limit. I am happy with the result and I would not be unhappy if the weather stays as it is today." The team's technical director Ross Brawn said that there was room for improvement. "We are reasonably happy," he said. "There is room for improvement because the balance of the cars on low fuel was not as perfect as it was this morning. As far as the tyres are concerned I would say, looking at this morning's session that we have a more consistent tyre than the opposition. That can be an advantage in the race. BMW WilliamsF1 Team: Juan Pablo Montoya 3rd, Ralf Schumacher 4th. Both Williams’s drivers made mistakes on their qualifying laps but both were happy with the cars. "We have made a lot of aerodynamic changes for this race and they have all worked out perfectly and we have a competitive car here," said senior operations engineer Sam Michael. "I lost my time at the first corner because of understeer," said Montoya. "But I am happy with the car. We can be ahead of Ferrari and McLaren here." West McLaren Mercedes: Kimi Raikkonen 1st, David Coulthard 6th. Kimi Raikkonen was fastest in the session and McLaren was happy with the result. "After a solid morning of practice in which the team worked on race set-up," said managing-director Martin Whitmarsh. "We are confident with the handling of the car in both the race and in qualifying trim. Kimi did a nice clean lap and was rewarded with an outstanding lap time. In the end David ran a little wide at the first corner and struggled a bit after that. But we are still confident that both drivers can do well." Coulthard said his problem had been one of understeer. "I needed a bit more knowledge of the track and the car to push more," said David. "There is a better time in the car but you have confidence in the car to get the maximum out of it." Mild Seven Renault F1 Team: Fernando Jarno Trulli 7th, Alonso 8th. The two R23s were behind the McLaren-Ferrari-Williams trio. "We made a lot of changes before the qualifying;" said chief engineer Pat Symonds, "but we have not yet got the best out of the cars. We are going to study the data and make some changes for tomorrow." Both drivers agreed that there is more time to come from the cars. Sauber Petronas: Heinz-Harald Frentzen 10th, Nick Heidfeld 13th. It was a fairly uneventful day for Sauber despite Nick Heidfeld knocking off his front wing in the morning on a bollard at the chicane. "This weekend we are using a new front suspension and a new rear wing," said technical director Willy Rampf. "These proved successful at the Silverstone test last week. We came here pretty well prepared and this morning made minor balance changes. Unusually both cars were tending to oversteer. This afternoon Heinz's lap was good until he got to the last sector by which time the rain was beginning and he lost four tenths. Nick had to run in the extreme wet conditions and although this was frustrating it was encouraging that the car was stable and he was the fastest of those who ran in the wet." Jordan Ford: Giancarlo Fisichella 9th, Ralph Firman 14th. "It is very difficult to judge where we are because our qualifying was split into two with Giancarlo running in the dry and Ralph in the extreme wet," said chief engineer Gary Anderson. "Giancarlo said that the balance of the car is OK but the time just doesn't seem to be there. Whether that is down to the tyres or the chassis is difficult to tell at this stage. We could have done a better job. Ralf was very competent in the conditions because it was very important for him to get a lap in order to be sure that he is not first out tomorrow. We want other cars running ahead of us to remove the water." Jaguar Racing: Mark Webber 12th, Antonio Pizzonia 18th. Both Jaguars were very quick in the morning session but the rain came at the wrong time for the team in the afternoon. "We are very disappointed," said managing director David Pitchforth. "The car was really good this morning and there is nothing we can do about the German weather. We learned a lot in Canada and in the test at Silverstone and we did a good job this morning and confirmed our predictions. We were all very buoyant. We are still hopeful for tomorrow but it all depends on the weather. Lucky Strike BAR Honda: Jenson Button 11th, Jacques Villeneuve No time. "This morning the balance of the cars was OK," said technical director Geoff Willis, "but both cars were struggling for grip. In qualifying it was Jenson who had the dry track but his lap was not that special because he clipped the bollard at the chicane and damaged the front wing and that cost half a second on the remainder of the lap. Jacques was very unlucky because it was starting to rain as he was about to go out. We had time to put on some wets and take off a bit of front wing but that was all we could do. If we had been running a bit later we would have used extreme weather tyres. Jacques had no chance and spun off." European Minardi Cosworth: Justin Wilson 15th, Jos Verstappen 16th. "We are astounded at seeing how good our performance is when we are on the same tyres as everyone else," said team boss Paul Stoddart. "When we have wets and extreme wets we are on exactly the same Bridgestones as the other teams and the times shows the difference." Panasonic Toyota Racing: Olivier Panis 17th, Cristiano da Matta No time. Olivier Panis was fastest in the morning session but everything went wrong for Toyota in the afternoon. "It was a brilliant result this morning for Olivier and we were all feeling very confident we had found a good set-up," said team manager Ange Pasquali. "However... we thought it would be dry and it wasn't. Cristiano was on dry tyres in the wet and clearly you could not drive with them in the conditions. The only option was to abort the lap. Olivier just went through the motions of doing his lap. Turn Eight was swimming with water." Bridgestone: Hisao Suganuma: "We are a bit disappointed not to see a Bridgestone car on provisional pole but we ran both the harder and softer compounds in the dry and their performance was reasonably good. We still have an advantage on rain tyres. Michelin: Pascal Vasselon: “We did well today working for the race on the dry track. This morning nine of the top 10 cars were Michelin runners. In qualifying the conditions changed a lot but the first part of the session confirmed what we saw this morning."