H
HardScrabble
Guest
Live qualifying for the starting grid tonight at 10:00 on Speed.
First round report:
Rubens Barrichello was fastest in the first qualifying session for Sunday's Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne, giving him the last run in tomorrow's all-important final qualifying period. But despite the Ferrari driver's position at the top of the times, the new format proved an entertaining success and threw up some big surprises.
The most significant of these was the pace of the BAR/Hondas, particularly in the hands of Jacques Villeneuve who qualified a spectacular third, despite getting only two fast laps in the morning free practice session before his engine expired. Kimi Raikkonen was second quickest for McLaren.
Barrichello set a time of 1:26.372, 0.179sec ahead of Raikkonen. "Everything is really new for everyone and I was quite excited going out there and doing the time," said the Brazilian, who's back problems didn't trouble him in today's admittedly limited running. "It's good to go and try out the new rules. This [session] is the best time to try and go as fast as you can."
Barrichello's time was nearly 0.8sec faster than teammate Michael Schumacher, who was fourth quickest, prompting speculation the World Champion ran with a heavier fuel load in order to get a feel for tomorrow's session that will decide the grid order. The German denied this, however.
“I am not usually that far off my teammate,” said Schumacher, “and I am a little disappointed, but we can work with fourth place on the grid and we will make some changes before tomorrow. Rubens was just quicker than me today.”
Villeneuve's teammate Jenson Button was initially fourth fastest before the Canadian bumped him down the order and team boss David Richards hinted that the much-publicized inter-team rivalry may have played its part.
“Jacques was extraordinary this afternoon,” said Richards. “I think Jenson's time may have wound him up a bit! This new qualifying format is a high-pressure environment and they suit certain drivers differently and I think that Jacques reacts well to that. He is very calm under pressure.”
Villeneuve was more surprised with his performance: “We had no time to do any setup work this morning, we had so little running. In fact I didn't even know where to brake! But the car is good and the tires held up well. We have been here enough times over the years for me to be able to find my way around.”
David Coulthard (McLaren) was a similar amount of time away from Raikkonen, but didn't make any mistakes and looked smooth for his lap of 1:27.242, good enough for sixth place. His added further weight to the theory some teams were running cars on differing strategies to evaluate setups for tomorrow, when fuel loads will be critical.
Renault's Fernando Alonso could have been higher than seventh but braked too deep into Turn Three and lost his momentum. The Spaniard still managed to outqualify his more experienced team-mate Jarno Trulli who was ninth, just slower than Toyota's Olivier Panis.
Juan Pablo Montoya was 10th and his time of 1:27.450 was indicative of just how poorly the new Williams/BMW performed. Montoya looked out of shape in several corners while his teammate Ralf Schumacher made a mistake early on in his lap and ended the session way down in 16th.
Cristiano da Matta looked good for a top-five time on his F1 qualifying debut. After the second split, the Brazilian was just over a tenth down on Barrichello, but was another to feel the single-lap pressure and missed a braking point leaving him 11th.
The Sauber/Petronas teammates both looked on the edge of an accident, the C22 was skittish and wild, Nick Heidfeld and Heinz-Harald Frentzen luridly sliding their way round to 12th and 13th ahead of Giancarlo Fisichella, who never recovered from technical problems he encountered on his Jordan/Ford during the morning session.
Jaguar Racing had looked good in the morning session, with Mark Webber fifth fastest, but a driver error by the Australian and a poor lap from rookie teammate Antonio Pizzonia saw the pair qualify 15th and 19th respectively.
British rookies Ralph Firman and Justin Wilson suffered for their lack of F1 track time. The Jordan driver went right off the track at Turn 13 and, although he recovered and blamed understeer, never looked likely to go any quicker than 17th. Wilson had no such moments and was less than 0.4sec off his more experienced teammate Jos Verstappen, although this was not enough to stop him being last, and therefore first off tomorrow morning.
First round report:
Rubens Barrichello was fastest in the first qualifying session for Sunday's Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne, giving him the last run in tomorrow's all-important final qualifying period. But despite the Ferrari driver's position at the top of the times, the new format proved an entertaining success and threw up some big surprises.
The most significant of these was the pace of the BAR/Hondas, particularly in the hands of Jacques Villeneuve who qualified a spectacular third, despite getting only two fast laps in the morning free practice session before his engine expired. Kimi Raikkonen was second quickest for McLaren.
Barrichello set a time of 1:26.372, 0.179sec ahead of Raikkonen. "Everything is really new for everyone and I was quite excited going out there and doing the time," said the Brazilian, who's back problems didn't trouble him in today's admittedly limited running. "It's good to go and try out the new rules. This [session] is the best time to try and go as fast as you can."
Barrichello's time was nearly 0.8sec faster than teammate Michael Schumacher, who was fourth quickest, prompting speculation the World Champion ran with a heavier fuel load in order to get a feel for tomorrow's session that will decide the grid order. The German denied this, however.
“I am not usually that far off my teammate,” said Schumacher, “and I am a little disappointed, but we can work with fourth place on the grid and we will make some changes before tomorrow. Rubens was just quicker than me today.”
Villeneuve's teammate Jenson Button was initially fourth fastest before the Canadian bumped him down the order and team boss David Richards hinted that the much-publicized inter-team rivalry may have played its part.
“Jacques was extraordinary this afternoon,” said Richards. “I think Jenson's time may have wound him up a bit! This new qualifying format is a high-pressure environment and they suit certain drivers differently and I think that Jacques reacts well to that. He is very calm under pressure.”
Villeneuve was more surprised with his performance: “We had no time to do any setup work this morning, we had so little running. In fact I didn't even know where to brake! But the car is good and the tires held up well. We have been here enough times over the years for me to be able to find my way around.”
David Coulthard (McLaren) was a similar amount of time away from Raikkonen, but didn't make any mistakes and looked smooth for his lap of 1:27.242, good enough for sixth place. His added further weight to the theory some teams were running cars on differing strategies to evaluate setups for tomorrow, when fuel loads will be critical.
Renault's Fernando Alonso could have been higher than seventh but braked too deep into Turn Three and lost his momentum. The Spaniard still managed to outqualify his more experienced team-mate Jarno Trulli who was ninth, just slower than Toyota's Olivier Panis.
Juan Pablo Montoya was 10th and his time of 1:27.450 was indicative of just how poorly the new Williams/BMW performed. Montoya looked out of shape in several corners while his teammate Ralf Schumacher made a mistake early on in his lap and ended the session way down in 16th.
Cristiano da Matta looked good for a top-five time on his F1 qualifying debut. After the second split, the Brazilian was just over a tenth down on Barrichello, but was another to feel the single-lap pressure and missed a braking point leaving him 11th.
The Sauber/Petronas teammates both looked on the edge of an accident, the C22 was skittish and wild, Nick Heidfeld and Heinz-Harald Frentzen luridly sliding their way round to 12th and 13th ahead of Giancarlo Fisichella, who never recovered from technical problems he encountered on his Jordan/Ford during the morning session.
Jaguar Racing had looked good in the morning session, with Mark Webber fifth fastest, but a driver error by the Australian and a poor lap from rookie teammate Antonio Pizzonia saw the pair qualify 15th and 19th respectively.
British rookies Ralph Firman and Justin Wilson suffered for their lack of F1 track time. The Jordan driver went right off the track at Turn 13 and, although he recovered and blamed understeer, never looked likely to go any quicker than 17th. Wilson had no such moments and was less than 0.4sec off his more experienced teammate Jos Verstappen, although this was not enough to stop him being last, and therefore first off tomorrow morning.
a little shake up going on in the ranks. I didn't think BAR is going to the that fast already. JV might have the ride to resurrecthis career. I do believe McLaren is sandbagging until tommorow and even tough he dinied, MS is doing the same. Don't know about Williams, looked allright a week ago, but they might have some problems, then next session will tell us a little more.