By Phil Giles
September 27 2003

Jordan have finished the first qualifying session for the US Grand Prix in 12th and 17th places. It was a mixed qualifying session which started dry but conditions quickly degenerated as the hour wore on. Giancarlo was able to run on a fairly dry track, although it had started to spot with rain.  By the time Ralph took to the track, it was necessary for the team to put full wet tyres on the car.

The session pulled a few surprises with Jarno Trulli putting his Renault on the top spot.  Championship contenders Juan Pablo, Michael and Kimi were able to run in the dry but Juan Pablo was fifth, Schumacher 8th and Raikonnen was 9th.  All of the contenders team mates were faster.

"It's great to be back out but the tyre choice was wrong."  said Ralph.  "In similar conditions during the testing session, there was more grip on the intermediate tyres."

The day was not without it's mechanical problems.  The EJ13 Gearbox gave Giancarlo cause for concern (A fault which showed up in last weeks testing) and during the free practice hour, yet another Cosworth Engine let go.  “I didn’t get enough laps in the morning, because I had a problem with the gearbox oil tank in testing and an engine blow-up during free practice." Said Fisi.  "As I lost most of today’s track time there wasn’t enough time to do all the work we wanted on set-up.  Considering that, qualifying was okay, the last part of the circuit was a bit damp when I went out. I hope we have these wet conditions again on Sunday.”

Gary Anderson summed up the days events: “Fisichella had a problem with a split gearbox oil cooler which lost him a lot of time in testing although he was able to do a reasonable job at the end of the session,” he said. “It was Ralph’s first time back since his accident and he did a competent job, learning the track pretty well in both the wet and the dry and he got up to speed okay. Giancarlo had an engine failure early on in Free Practice which lost him most of that session as well and hurt his qualifying because we had a few things we wanted to try but never got them done. Qualifying was a bit disappointing but that was mainly down to the weather and also Giancarlo had to go out with a lower performance step engine. We took a gamble with Ralph’s tyres and sent him out on extreme wets, which is always difficult in these conditions. We did the best we could, and hopefully Sunday will be wet and we’ll get something out of it.”

The second qualifying session will be broadcast by ITV at 11:45pm.  Now there's commitment to the fans (of Pop Idol).