10/07/2004

Grand Prix of Great Britain - Qualifying Report

Panasonic Toyota Racing drivers Cristiano da Matta and Olivier Panis will start the British Grand Prix round 11 of this year's Formula 1 World Championship from 12th and 19th positions on the Silverstone grid respectively. Panis actually qualified 12th fastest overall but was adjudged to have impeded Sauber driver Felipe Massa's qualifying lap.

The outcome is that the FIA stewards decided to delete the Frenchman's qualifying lap. He will still start ahead of the Sauber of Giancarlo Fisichella after the Italian failed to set a lap time in the second qualifying session.

Panis was adjudged to have breached article 120 of the FIA F1 sporting regulations as he came slowly back to the pits after setting his time.

"I am obviously very disappointed and upset that my time in qualifying was cancelled. I pushed very hard and did the best that I could with the car. With the strategy we have in place for tomorrow I think we performed well. A mistake in communication from the team meant that I only saw Massa late but I immediately moved over and offline. I am sorry for the Sauber team because it was not intentional and I did all I could not to impede his lap. I am very annoyed at the decision from the stewards. Tomorrow's race will now be very hard but I will push all the way as I always do."

Entirely separately and unrelated Silverstone's pre-qualifying session which determines the order that the cars run for the all-important qualifying lap saw a bizarre situation with a number of drivers purposely going slowly in order to be among the first to run in the qualifying period when rain was widely expected. Some even ran wide and spun deliberately in case they were adjudged to have infringed article 151c of the international sporting code which outlaws "any act prejudicial to the interests of motor sport generally."

At the end of one of the season's most confusing qualifying periods Da Matta said: "In the final analysis everyone got their qualifying laps in without interruption from any rain and we were able to make the best of a lot of hard work we did analysing the data after the first day's free practice. The car felt a lot better but the competition is stiff and I think we are in for another tough race tomorrow. On the plus side we can look forward to the debut of our revised car at Hockenheim."

As Da Matta pointed out the anticipated rain held off and it was Kimi Raikkonen (1m18.233s) who claimed pole position for West McLaren Mercedes his and the team's first since the US Grand Prix last year. Rubens Barrichello (1m18.305s) was second quickest for Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro ahead of home hero Jenson Button (1m18.580s) who was last out and had a nail-biting time waiting to see if he was going to get a lap on a dry track. Nine-time 2004 winner Michael Schumacher (1m18.710s) was fourth quickest in the second Ferrari ahead of Jarno Trulli (1m18.715s) and Mild Seven Renault team mate Fernando Alonso (1m18.811s) who will start 10 places further back on the grid after needing an engine change following Saturday morning free practice.

Mike Gascoyne summed up a bizarre qualifying day: "The team has to apologise to Olivier for not ensuring that he was fully informed of Massa's position on the track however he immediately moved offline and having reviewed the evidence in the stewards meeting we were sure that Massa could take the racing line and not be held up in any way. We are therefore very disappointed in the stewards' decision to disallow Olivier's time and we feel that the penalty is both too harsh and undeserved. I personally think this is true given what happened in the first qualifying session where teams clearly deceived the public by not ensuring their drivers pushed to the limit. I hope the crowd was entertained by the second qualifying session because the first one was a disgrace in front the huge numbers of people who have turned up at Silverstone today. It is unbelievable that the fans are let down in such a way and then such a penalty was given to one of the few drivers who pushed hard and entertained the crowds in both qualifying sessions. I only hope Olivier can have a good race and score points tomorrow to make up for what was an extremely disappointing decision."