Hockenheim Qualifying Report

By nGO
July 29 2006

Sakon's practice accident forced him to use the T car, badly compromising his qualifying performance. But Sato shows the SA06's potential his Qually pace was Super Aguri's best all season. Takuma Sato will start 17th ahead of both Midlands while Yamamoto may start on the backrow.

This weekend was the first time the SA06 has been used in Grand Prix conditions, with problems hindering progress earlier in the weekend. Saturday was bittersweet as F1 debutant Yamamoto and Sato were similar on lap times showing good pace, but an accident at the end of Saturday practice while trying to explore the limits, means Yamamoto qualified with the older model T car. However Sato gave the team a glimmer of hope as he lapped the new Super Aguri car to within a whisker of Albers time, and was within a second to making it into the second session. Yamamoto was crawling along in a non-tuned SA05 after this morning's free practice accident, but there is a possibility of him use the SA06 tomorrow.

Due to Trulli and Albers taking penalties for a change in engines Sato will start 17th, having set a best time of 1:17.185. Yamamoto is provisionally 21st having set a best time of 1:20.444.

Sato shows some of the SA06's potential, setting a best lap of 1:17.185, “This was an absolutely fantastic team effort and it feels great. I know how hard it has been to bring the new car here on such a tight schedule and overnight the boys worked so hard. We had a few minor problems, which is usual with a new car, but I think the SA06 is performing very well. We have split the Midland car times straight away in our first proper qualifying, which is a stunning job from everybody in the team. I think that, considering this is just our first step in the SA06, potentially this car could be very good.”

An unfortunate day for a sorry Yamamoto, having shown good pace earlier on he was relegated to using the old car after a morning accident, he set a best time of 1:20.444, “This morning we were practicing for the qualifying session and we had a good car set-up, so during my first run I was able to set really good lap times. We then tried a new set of tyres and set-up and I wanted to know where the limit of the car was, so I used 100% of the car’s performance, but unfortunately I left the track. I am so sorry that the team now has to work on my SA06 for tomorrow, but I am very much looking forward to my first race.”

Finishing is still the priority for Aguri, “Taku did a very good job in Qualifying today. However we must remember that this is not our complete SA06 package and that we still have to work very hard for every forthcoming race. Sakon set consistently good times this morning, but he pushed too hard towards the end. Hopefully both he and Takuma will have a good race tomorrow and we will have both SA06 cars cross the finish line here in Germany.”