Michael Spins And Rubens Is Slow
By Dale Calkins
August 22 2005
Qualifying was very difficult for the Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro team today as Schumacher spun and Barrichello was slow. Barrichello and Schumacher both suffered from a severe lack of grip caused by their inferior Bridgestone tyres.
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Michael Spins And Rubens Is Slow |
Dale Calkins |
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Michael
Schumacher Q: No Time Michael Schumacher came into this Grand Prix weekend, hoping to build on success in the previous round. Unfortunately, Bridgestone has really let Ferrari down and the the Italian team has absolutely no grip at this circuit. Michael Schumacher pushed hard in qualifying and was aiming for a top ten position. Schumacher pushed too hard and had a spin at turn nine. Schumacher will now start second last, after the team changed his engine after his spin. Here is what the 7-Time World Champion had to say about his qualifying run in Turkey: "We have been uncompetitive all weekend so far, therefore I had not expected to qualify very well: maybe around seventh place, which would not have been too bad for tomorrow’s race. Even though we should really be looking for race wins, we could at least have been fighting for points. But, I went off the track and this is the result. We had expected Turn 9 to be difficult as the wind had picked up and I thought I had taken this into account, but obviously not enough. In the race, all I can do is push hard and try and do my best. It is still important for us to do as well as possible here, to help our chances in qualifying at Monza. After our performance in Hockenheim and Budapest, this weekend is clearly a step backwards." Rubens Barrichello Q: 11th - 1'29.369 Rubens was extremely slow in the Saturday practice sessions as he was down with the Minardis and Jordans on the time sheets. Then Barrichello was just hopeless in this qualifying session as he couldn't do anything at all with his tyres being so poor. Rubens will start way back in 11th position, which is not extremely bad, though it is certainly not ideal. Here is what the Brazilian had to say after his session: "Even though we adopted a conservative approach to qualifying, I was fighting with a lack of grip from the car. I am confident the tyres will be good for the race, however, in qualifying we had some graining issues, which cost me time in the final sector where I had too much understeer. My lap was on the limit of what I could do and for tomorrow I think eleventh place means I can have a good race especially as the car seems to perform better when the tyres are worn than when they are completely new. It’s a shame for Michael that he went off." Ross Brawn Technical Director Ferrari's Technical Director Ross Brawn, was troubled by today's qualifying results but he is still confident of a better race. Here is what Ross had to say about the qualifying session: "After our performance this morning, we adopted a more conservative strategy. Even so, Rubens was unable to lap as quickly as we had expected. I think Michael might just have scraped into a top six position if he had not gone off, which with the fuel load he was carrying and an expected consistent performance in the race, could have been a good place to be. The track conditions did not change very much from the morning, but there was a lot of dust on the track from people going off all over the place." |
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August 20, 2005 |
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