Austrian Grand Prix - Qualifying
TRULLI AIMS FOR CONSISTENCY Jordan Honda driver maintains qualifying form and looks for points Jarno Trulli qualified his Benson & Hedges Jordan Honda fifth on tomorrow's grid for the Austrian Grand Prix, recording his fourth third row start this season. His achievement was underlined by the fact that he only completed five laps in the first session of this morning's free practice before suffering an engine failure, the engine change performed at high-speed but leaving him with just 25 minutes of the second session to arrive at a qualifying set-up. Lucky Strike BAR Honda's Olivier Panis will start from 10th position, while the second Jordan Honda of Heinz-Harald Frentzen and BAR Honda of Jacques Villenueve start 11th and 12th respectively. Pole position was taken by Ferrari's Michael Schumacher, whose main challenge came from the BMW Williams of Juan Pablo Montoya and Ralf Schumacher, not as expected from David Coulthard and Mika Hakkinen, who finished the morning's free practice first and second fastest respectively. Their McLarens sit seventh and eighth on tomorrow's grid while the second Ferrari of Rubens Barrichello and the Sauber of Nick Heidfeld complete the front three rows, flanking Trulli in fourth and sixth positions. Jarno Trulli Position: 5th "I am very happy with this unexpected result, given the problems I had this morning. I want to thank the team as they worked so hard to get me back on track this morning and it's thanks to them I was able to do so well in qualifying. My first timed lap was the best but unfortunately I couldn't improve as it felt like the car's power was dropping away with every lap. In the little time we had this morning we found a good set-up and the car felt very good this afternoon. We lose a lot of time in the third sector and need to find out why, as this has also been the case in previous races here. For the race I would just be happy to remain consistent and finish in the points." Kazutoshi Nishizawa - Technical Director, Honda Racing Development "Jarno's performance today is pleasing, especially considering his limited running this morning. We are clearly disappointed with the overall result and there will be a great deal of work tonight to ensure we are well-prepared for tomorrow's race." Eddie Jordan, Chief Executive, Jordan Honda "Qualifying was very tight with a mixed bag of events for the Jordan Honda team. It's nice to be on the third row of the grid and in front of the McLarens but it will be a tight race with a very competitive group of cars up at the front. Jarno got it together very well for his first lap but Heinz had a problem with understeer so wasn't able to make much improvement which is a shame." Craig Pollock, Team Principal and Managing Director, BAR Honda "One of the most unusual dry qualifying sessions I have ever seen. I don't think that either Jacques or Olivier got the best out of their cars today but looking at the grid line-up it is going to make it a very interesting race. Looking at our past form we seem to perform better in the race than in qualifying and we will be looking to capitalise on that tomorrow." Today's results Pole Michael Schumacher Ferrari 1m09.562s 2 Juan Pablo Montoya Williams BMW 1m09.686s 3 Ralf Schumacher Williams BMW 1m09.769s 4 Rubens Barrichello Ferrari 1m09.786s 5 Jarno Trulli Jordan Honda 1m10.202s 6 Nick Heidfeld Sauber Petronas 1m10.211s 10 Olivier Panis BAR Honda 1m10.435s 11 Heinz-Harald Frentzen Jordan Honda 1m10.923s 12 Jacques Villeneuve BAR Honda 1m11.058s -------------------------------------------------------------- Honda Formula 1 Press Office, 19 Heathmans Road, London, SW6 4TJ, UK Tel: +44 (0)20 7384 2133 Fax: +44 (0)20 7384 1238