Team comment after Canadian qualifying


By Huw Alban
June 8 2002

The frustration experienced by the team in Canada today is plain to read in their post qualifying press release. With Heinz running repeatedly in the top six during all of the practices the team looked in good shape, but they are now looking to the race where they know they’ll be stronger. Heinz-Harald Frentzen:

“It wasn’t our day today. We made a few changes after this morning’s sessions to correct a little understeer, but when I went out on my first run the car was unbalanced. I then had a water leak which knocked me out of my rhythm. Once we were back on track the weather took a turn for the worse and I couldn’t get any more time out of the car.”

Enrique Bernoldi:

“Although I could improve with each run we just couldn’t get it together today. It is frustrating to be pipped for position by a Jaguar, as they are our benchmark, but that’s the way it turned out. Historically we are always better in race trim so I’m hoping for a more successful day tomorrow.”

Graham Taylor, Chief Race Engineer:

“We were caught out by the change in the track conditions today. There was a big shift in balance from this morning to this afternoon and the changes we made to the car in between sessions were negated by the changes in track conditions. We discovered Heinz’s car had a water leak after his first run and we lost a fair bit of time fixing that. We sent him out for his second run shortly after Sato went off to check the balance for the final runs. We couldn’t improve much on that run because of the oil on the track. Unfortunately the rain began on his third run so that was the end of the day for him. Enrique did a good job, steadily improving his lap times, but his progress was also stunted by the changes in conditions. All in all a disappointing day so now we will put all our efforts into having a good race tomorrow.”

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