Sunday: Second Qualifying Session
"Toyota's First Front Row Position!"

With new regulations stipulating a second qualifying session on Sunday mornings, today stood to be an extremely busy day of racing.

"Last year there weren't Sunday morning qualifying sessions, but we still had to be at the circuit at seven o'clock to get the cars out of the secured garages. Still, it's much busier this year," said Keizo Takahashi, Panasonic-Toyota Director of Technical Coordination (DTC).

The final qualifying session started at 10 a.m. The skies were cloudy, threatening rain, but DTC Takahashi was confident that today's qualifying session would be dry. Felipe Massa, who recorded a "no time" in yesterday's qualifying, did not even make it out on the course today, so the first car on the track was that of Takuma Sato. Sato fared only slightly better, having to head back to the pits after only one lap. Even the great Michael Schumacher, last year's winner, wasn't able to make an attack run on the course, so it was up to Ralf Schumacher to make the first serious challenge of the day. With Sato and Michael Schumacher recording no times and extremely slow laps, their teams decided to replace their engines rather than attempt to improve their qualifying positions. Of course, replacing an engine means losing any chance of a better qualifying position, but the drivers were already way back in the pack, and unlikely to improve much anyway. As we saw yesterday and today, the new regulations this year have already had a significant influence on team strategy.

"Since Ralf was the first driver to attack the course, the track was pretty slippery," said Takahashi. Even so, Ralf recorded a 1m 31.222s lap, improving his position from 17th to 15th. "Trulli had a fairly substantial lead over the next position, so we decided to add fuel with an eye toward our race strategy. The fuel effect is very important here, and our strategy reflected that fact."

Jarno Trulli was the nineteenth driver to take the track in qualifying this morning. He didn't disappoint, scoring a strong 1m 29.159s lap, and keeping the front row position he won by qualifying second yesterday.

"With only about five cars left, it seemed like the track improved quite a bit. I can't say anything for sure, though, since I don't know what the other teams did with their fuel and tires."

Securing their first-ever front row for the race, the Toyota pit was tremendously excited. Messrs. Toyoda Shoichiro, Toyota Motor Corp. honorary chairman, and Hiroshi Okuda, Toyota Motor Corp. chairman, came to Australia to lend their support the Panasonic-Toyota team. Both gentlemen were extremely pleased with the good news out of the qualifying sessions.

Sunday: Final
"A Feeling Toyota can Compete with the Elites"

The clouds began to break up just before the 2 o'clock afternoon start, and temperatures started to rise above the morning chill. At starting time, air temperature was 19Ž, and the track temperature had warmed up to 26Ž. When Kimi Raikonnen stalled at the start, the field ran one more formation lap before getting under way. Trulli kept his clam after the first false start, hitting the flag strong, and maintaining second position as he chased leader Giancarlo Fisichella. The two continued to battle for the top spot, running at nearly the same pace until lap eighteen, when Trulli scored a quicker refueling stop over Fisichella. Unfortunately, trouble occurred out of the pits.

"Trulli started strong, and kept a good pace over the opening part of the race. However, after pitting, the car developed tire developed. Trulli reported from the cockpit that the car was vibrating wildly."

Trulli had to slow, and Fisichella took the opportunity to open a wide lead in a matter of seconds. Even hampered by tire trouble, Trulli drove like a man possessed, maintaining a pace good enough to stay near seventh position, which would qualify to earn series points.

"We still didn't know what was wrong with the tires. Both air pressure and temperature were fine, and we could tell the tire surface hadn't peeled off, because we could see they were still completely black. Something was happening that we hadn't seen before," said a disappointed DTC Takahashi after the race. "I guess we used up all of our luck in the qualifying sessions."

Ralf, who had faded to the back positions in qualifying, quickly moved up several spots at the start of the race, but then he ran into difficulties attempting to pass slower cars. Ralf was fighting to secure ninth spot when he got unlucky at his first pit. After pitting on lap 19 to refuel, Ralf unexpectedly pitted again only two laps later. His seatbelt had come loose during the first pit. The unplanned second pit made Ralf lose a lot of time to the field.

"Ralf was kind-of buried in the middle of the pack during the first part of the race, frustrated that he couldn't run faster. During the second half, on the other hand, he ran great lap times, but couldn't improve his position. His rear tires held up very well the entire race."

In the end, the excitement and momentum of the qualifying turned to disappointment for the Panasonic-Toyota Racing team. Trulli finished in ninth place, and Ralf was able to come back to finish the race at 12th.

"After this race, I really believe we have come to a place in our program where we can compete with the elite teams. I was extremely pleased with Trulli's great driving early in the race, Ralf's strong finish, and the performance of the tires. We weren't quite used to the new regulations, but now we know where the traps and tricks are. If Trulli hadn't run into trouble, I think we would have finished well at the top today."

Although today's results may have been disappointing for Panasonic-Toyota Racing, all indications were extremely positive. And perhaps no one may be more positive about the rest of the season than DTC Takahashi.