Difficult race for Toyota F1 at Imola

Da Matat
By Toyota F1 Media
April 28 2004

The Toyota F1 team would have a difficult race at Imola for the San Marino GP, with Panis finishing tenth and Da Matta retiring after spinning off when he was to have difficulties with his traction control system.

	San Marino GP Race Round-Up
	Sunday 25 April 2004 Cristiano da Matta (Car 16, Chassis TF104/04) Session Classification: DNF, +30 laps from race winner Grid: 10th "The weekend started quite positively with a top ten qualifying position, but unfortunately the race did not continue the trend. I was given a Drive Through penalty and followed my normal procedure when I came into the pits. That involves pressing two buttons - one for the pit lane speed limiter and one for the launch procedure. But the launch button also disables the traction control and, of course, this time I was not actually stopping. I got to the first chicane, where I was caught out by not having any traction control and went off the circuit. It is a mistake, but very frustrating... The only thing to do is to look forward to Barcelona, a track that should be more suited to the TF104." Olivier Panis (Car 17, Chassis TF104/03) Session Classification: 11th, +1 lap from race winner Grid: 13th "Once again we proved the reliability of the TF104 and I was able to extend my 100% finishing record this year. I pushed very hard throughout the race and we did some good pit stops but we still need to develop better pace. Everybody in the team has worked really hard which is reflected by our consistency. We have to continue concentrating on making improvements to our performance and the progress we have made since Melbourne shows that sooner rather than later, the effort should pay off." Tsutomu Tomita - Team Principal "It was a long, difficult race and we are disappointed not to get the two cars to the finish. Both drivers had reasonable starts and were quite competitive through the first stint. Although we were able to race some of the cars around us, our race pace was not good enough to keep up with the field in front. Then Cristiano got a Drive Through penalty for a blue flag incident. Unfortunately he made a mistake in his switch settings which disabled the traction control and meant he went off at the chicane. Overall not a bad weekend for us as we made further steps ahead. Nevertheless to score points we need to make more improvements so that we have a quicker race car." T-car: TF104/06 (set-up for Olivier Panis) Spare chassis: TF104/05