By Jamie Makin
July 24 2004

SAUBER PETRONAS drivers Giancarlo Fisichella and Felipe Massa finished 17th and 16th respectively after today´s first practice sessions for the German Grand Prix. Friday, Free Practice 1:

Driver	Chassis	Best Time	Position
G. Fisichella	C23-04	1:16.451	5
F. Massa	C23-01	1:17.361	14
Spare Car	C23-02	-	-

Friday, Free Practice 2:

Driver	Chassis	Best Time	Position
G. Fisichella	C23-04	1:17.026	17
F. Massa	C23-01	1:16.865	16
Spare Car	C23-02	-	-

Despite a 5th place rank for Giancarlo Fisichella in the first Friday practice session, team SAUBER PETRONAS knows they have a great deal of work ahead of them for this weekend's German Grand Prix. Fisichella spent the day struggling with the car's balance and the engineers will have to analyse a great deal of data tonight in hopes of making improvements for tomorrow.

"The balance of the car was still not good this afternoon. I had oversteer going into the hairpin which turned to understeer at the midpoint. It wasn´t so bad in the higher-speed corners, but we still have work to do to improve things."

Felipe Massa seemed happier with his car, although his 14th and 16th place rank in the practice sessions do not show his true pace yet. "It was a good day for me. We focused on long runs and my first impression is that things are better than I expected. The tyre choice is not straightforward, but our race pace today was good. Qualifying, however, will be difficult for us."

The concerns for qualifying centre around ongoing tyre problems which are not allowing quick lap times straight out of the garage. The high temperatures at the Hockenheimring favor the Michelin runners creating another challenge for Bridgestone-shod SAUBER. The only thing that could save the team in qualifying tomorrow is the high chance of rain predicted for the session. Bridgestone still holds an edge over Michelin in moderately wet conditions and rain could allow Fisichella and Massa to start further up the grid. This would be a welcome advantage on race day which is expected to be hot but dry.

Team owner Peter Sauber sounds confident as usual. "We concentrated on race set-up work today and I believe that we are now well prepared. We have a lot of data to analyse before we make our tyre selection this evening, and tomorrow morning we will focus on honing the car for qualifying."

SAUBER has gained some good results from ideal pit strategies this season and will look for the best overall outcome again this weekend.

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