10/10/2003

Japanese Grand Prix - First Qualifying Report

Panasonic Toyota Racing has finished the first day of qualifying for the final Grand Prix of the season in Japan with Olivier Panis and Cristiano da Matta in 13th and 14th places respectively.
It is the 30-year-old Brazilian's first experience of Suzuka which is widely regarded to be one of the most challenging circuits on the F1 schedule as well as having the longest lap. In the circumstances Da Matta has got himself acclimatised to the 5.807km track very quickly and his time 1m32.256s just 0.35s from his team mate is a strong effort.

Panis said: "We have not got the TF103 chassis quite to our liking yet. We have tried various different set-ups but it is quite a technical track with a good combination of different corners. I am a little bit short of grip in places and hopefully we can improve tomorrow and try to qualify the car in the top 10."

Da Matta added: "I like the circuit and I think I can find some more time in the first sector of the lap which includes the fast Esses. There is lap time to be gained for sure but to realise it we need to make some improvements to the car and gain a bit of grip. There is no point in pushing too hard and going off."

At the front of the field Jarno Trulli took advantage of the mileage from Renault's extra two hours of testing to set the quickest time 1m30.281s some 0.06s quicker than Ralf Schumacher in the quicker of the two BMW Williams F1 Team cars. Michael Schumacher's Ferrari (1m30.464s) was third fastest ahead of the West McLaren Mercedes duo David Coulthard (1m30.482) and championship chaser Kimi Raikkonen (1m30.558s). Fernando Alonso's Renault (1m30.624s) completed the top six.

Suzuka of course is Toyota's home race and the team is looking to get a strong result this weekend to finish the season in style. The TF103s have new aerodynamic parts for the Japanese Grand Prix including new rear and front wings and a new specification of RVX-03 engine. The team is keen to have productive free practice sessions on Saturday morning prior to the all-important second qualifying session in the afternoon.

Team principal Ove Andersson said: "As our official home race this is an important Grand Prix for us. There are only six points splitting fifth place in the constructors championship from ninth and of course Suzuka brings down the final curtain on the season. There are no more opportunities after this. We have a new specification RVX-03 engine for this race as well as some aerodynamic modifications so hopefully we can aim at our target which as always is to qualify in the front half of the grid and to challenge for points."

Elsewhere there is added Japanese flavour on track with Takuma Sato replacing Jacques Villeneuve in the Lucky Strike BAR Honda team.