23/10/2004

Grand Prix of Brazil - Qualifying Round-Up

Jarno Trulli (Car 16 Chassis TF104/10B)
Pre-Qualifying: 10th
Lap Time: 1m10.478s (+0.656s)
Qualifying: 10th
Lap Time: 1m11.483s (+0.837s)
Grid Position: 9th
"I am extremely happy with our performance in qualifying. It was a very good lap and the car was well balanced. I believe that I pushed the car to the absolute limit which makes me particularly satisfied. I am also quite confident for the race because we have been consistent over the long runs in the practice sessions. We have to wait and see what weather conditions we will have in tomorrow's race because slightly hotter temperatures could affect us. That aside we should be encouraged by this result especially considering the greatly reduced gap we have to the front running teams."

Ricardo Zonta (Car 17 Chassis TF104/09B)
Pre-Qualifying: 15th
Lap Time: 1m11.315s (+1.493s)
Qualifying: 15th
Lap Time: 1m11.974s (+1.328s)
Grid Position: 14th
"I was happy with the balance of the car in the morning practice but we had to make some changes to the car to avoid wearing the floor too much. Unfortunately the car became very understeery and although we tried to solve the problem it was too late for the second qualifying session. On my lap I had a lot of understeer particularly in the slower corners where I couldn't improve my lap time. I am disappointed because I had hoped to do a good job in front of all the Brazilian people but the weekend is far from over. We have to remain positive for the race and try to score points."

Mike Gascoyne - Technical Director Chassis
"It was a mixed qualifying session. Ricardo struggled with a lot of understeer on his car in both sessions and wasn't able to match his times from this morning which were set on similar fuel loads. Jarno was happier with the balance and produced an impressive lap to qualify inside the top ten. Given the consistency and pace we have had over the long runs this weekend we should expect to have a relatively strong race. We need to look to score points tomorrow to improve our position in the championship and I firmly believe that we should be able to do just that."