Ferrari San Marino GP Practice
At home in Imola
By Ferrari Press Release (23/4/2004)
April 24 2004
The BAR-Honda team monopolised the theoretical 'front row' of the grid at the end of today’s second free practice session, run in warm and sunny weather at the 'Enzo e Dino Ferrari' circuit.
Jenson Button was quickest (1.20.966) followed by team-mate, Takuma Sato (1.21.159.) In fact, the Anglo-Japanese team created an interesting statistic, as its third driver, Anthony Davidson, who is only allowed to drive under the regulation allowing the six bottom teams from 2003 to run the extra car on Friday, finished sixth fastest (1.21.643.) This makes the Anglo-Japanese team the first to have three drivers in the top six of an official F1 time sheet in the modern era. Michael Schumacher completed a total of 23 laps on his way to third fastest time (1.21.164) for Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro. Fourth fastest was Kimi Raikkonen for McLaren-Mercedes (1.21.586) and fifth was Jarno Trulli for Renault (1.21.604).
In the other F2004, Rubens Barrichello did 20 laps, setting the eleventh best time of 1.22.096. The Brazilian was not particularly happy with the set-up of his car, although Schumacher was more so. However, from a technical point of view, the Scuderia gathered enough data to make the all important tyre choice for the rest of the weekend, while working on the braking system, which always gets a hard time on this track because of the slow chicanes. Engineers will now be analysing the data to fine tune the overall performance of the car for this demanding track.
Michael Schumacher (Driver):
"We had an interesting day. We were very quick in the morning and a little bit slower in the afternoon. We had a clear picture of what set-up we required having tested at this track in the winter, but our competitors have picked up their pace during the course of the day and I think the rest of the weekend will also be interesting. I think we can fight for the win on Sunday, but it will not be an easy task."
Rubens Barrichello (Driver):
"I was not too satisfied with the set up of my car and I had some oversteer. In longer stretches my times were the same as Michael's but I wasn't as fast with the new tyres. I am still optimistic about the weekend ahead, though. Tomorrow will be different. Tonight I will go over the data with my engineers and see where we went wrong."
As to the good showing of BAR-Honda, Rubens responded that for now they can be considered the second strongest team in the championship. He went on to say that the other teams shouldn't be forgotten as they would put up a good fight.
Ross Brawn (Technical Director):
"One of our main tasks today was evaluating the two types of tyre available to us and we have gathered enough data to make a choice. We were able to do very long runs to simulate tyre behaviour in the race, We also worked on the brakes which get a hard time at this track. Michael was reasonably happy with the set-up on his car, but one could say that Rubens was less so. Now we have to work on optimising our package for qualifying and the race."
Jean Todt (General Director):
"The first day of this race weekend has confirmed our car’s potential and it seems to work well on this track. There is still a lot of work to do to be as well prepared as possible for qualifying and the race, but we are confident and believe we will be competitive. Once again, Bridgestone has done a good job."