Spanish GP - First Qualifying
Weather: Sunny, dry, 24°C Air, 38°C Track
Barcelona (ESP). The BMW WilliamsF1 Team drivers Ralf Schumacher and Juan Pablo
Montoya finished in 11th and 14th positions respectively in the first
qualifying session of the Spanish Grand Prix, which will start on Sunday 14:00
hrs local time. The Circuit de Catalunya is known for being extremely
challenging regarding the set-up of the cars as the conditions are usually very
variable.
Ralf Schumacher: 11th
Chassis: FW25 05
Best time: 1.18,409 min
Obviously the first qualifying session was not satisfying for me. I was
struggling with the balance of the car and made a few mistakes. In one corner I
nearly lost the car. Though, I am not too worried. In qualifying we have not
yet seen the full potential of the FW25. Now we will go ahead to further
improve the set-up for tomorrow's practice sessions and final qualifying.
Juan Pablo Montoya: 14th
Chassis: FW25 06 (Spare Car FW25 04)
Best time: 1.18,687 min
We knew that this was going to be a difficult weekend for us and this
afternoon's times show that we are still struggling in finding the right
balance for our car on this track. I had some oversteer on my qualifying lap
which severely affected my performance. Let's work on it now and hopefully sort
it out for tomorrow.
Sam Michael (Chief Operations Engineer, WilliamsF1):
After looking competitive this morning we went in the wrong direction on the
set up and had a few problems with the balance on both cars which caused us to
lose quite a bit of time in qualifying. Now we are going to have a look at the
data to make sure we can sort this our for tomorrow, even though tomorrow is a
different story anyway because we are going to set up the car for the race.
Mario Theissen (BMW Motorsport Director):
In the Free Practice both the drivers, especially Ralf, had succeeded in
setting up the car for this track quite well but in qualifying they were both
unhappy with their balance. Our times and positions show that the track
conditions have changed since this morning. However, the time that Ralf
achieved this morning in Free Practice would have been good for first position
in qualifying.
