Friday translation

PANIS SETS HONDA PACE Olivier Panis leads Honda quartet in free practice

Olivier Panis set the pace for the Honda-powered quartet today in Imola in free practice for the San Marino Grand Prix this Sunday with the fifth fastest time overall of 1m26.535s. His Lucky Strike Reynard BAR Honda team-mate, Jacques Villeneuve, recorded the seventh fastest time of the day, while the Benson & Hedges Jordan Honda pairing of Jarno Trulli and Heinz-Harald Frentzen were ninth and 13th fastest respectively.

Michael Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello fired Italian home hopes for Ferrari success this weekend by topping the timesheet, first and second fastest respectively. Ralf Schumacher continued Williams BMW's rising form by going third fastest, with McLaren Mercedes' Mika Hakkinen logging the fourth fastest time in front of Panis.

As many teams usually spend much of Friday's two one-hour sessions focusing on race set-up, both Honda-partner teams secured useful data by completing a high number of laps.

Olivier Panis Position: 5th "I'm happy with the development of the car and the new aero package. We were quick both in the wet and dry, which is good. We need to make our tyre choice which is difficult because the conditions could well change. I am looking forward to qualifying and the race."

Kazutoshi Nishizawa - Technical Director, Honda Racing Development "It was a good start to the weekend as both teams had no problems either on the chassis or engine side. As a result we now have a lot of data to work on to maximise our race performance. As to tomorrow I see no reason why all four cars cannot be in the top 10."

Craig Pollock, BAR Honda "A good day for us. The new aero kit seems to work well in the wet and the dry. It is heartening to see both guys up at the front. We have to make sure we get a good set-up for qualifying and the race."

Tim Holloway, Head of Engineering, Jordan Honda "The conditions today varied every time the cars went out, so it was difficult to work on car set-up. We gained some good data though and now need to think about qualifying tomorrow."

Today's results 1 Michael Schumacher Ferrari 1:25.096 2 Rubens Barrichello Ferrari 1:25.372 3 Ralf Schumacher Williams BMW 1:25.829 4 Mika Hakkinen McLaren Mercedes 1:26.341 5 Olivier Panis BAR Honda 1:26.535 6 Kimi Raikkonen Sauber Petronas 1:26.552 8 Jacques Villeneuve BAR Honda 1:26.739 9 Jarno Trulli Jordan Honda 1:26.923 13 Heinz-Harald Frentzen Jordan Honda 1:27.406

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