FORMULA ONE: Villeneuve rides high in French heat

Posted By Terry Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel

June 30, 2001

BAR Honda driver third fastest in free practice

A productive first day of free practice at Magny Cours in preparation for the French Grand Prix this weekend saw Lucky Strike BAR Honda's Jacques Villeneuve set the third fastest time overall and top the Honda-powered quartet of drivers. Jarno Trulli posted the ninth fastest time in his Benson and Hedges Jordan Honda, while BAR Honda's Olivier Panis finished the session 11th fastest and Heinz-Harald Frentzen in the second Jordan Honda was13th.

Magny Cours bathed in hot summer sun during free practice, bringing high ambient and track temperatures. While the air temperature hovered around the 30 degrees Celsius mark, the track temperature rose as high as 47 degrees at one point. McLaren's David Coulthard set about his chase of Michael Schumacher by going fastest overall - the championship-leading Ferrari driver and European Grand Prix winner ranked seventh fastest today - while Jaguar's Eddie Irvine finished the day second, with Villeneuve third followed by the second McLaren of Mika Hakkinen.

Jacques Villeneuve Position: 3rd

"It was a positive session today because we were able to do a lot of good work. We took the fuel down to try to improve on our qualifying performance because that's where we have the most problems. The car was running well this morning set-up wise so we wanted to take the fuel down and see how we could get the most for the tyres. They seem to have helped a lot so I'm very happy with the improvements. It looks like we will be able to really make the tyres work for us so we're confident about tomorrow. We should be better in qualifying than we were at the previous race."

Kazutoshi Nishizawa - Technical Director, Honda Racing Development "Overall it was a good day. Olivier couldn't get the best out of the second session so we will have to try to catch up tomorrow. We are expecting a hot race on Sunday so we are working on the best package for those conditions."

Jock Clear, Race Engineer to Jacques Villeneuve, BAR Honda "A positive session but we are not kidding ourselves that it is our realistic position. We have tested here so there is certain stuff that we don't need to evaluate on a Friday. We have been doing some qualifying work which makes our position today look a little bit more impressive but we are not third quickest. The tyres have worked very well - they're doing what they said they would do so we're looking forward to qualifying and are optimistic."

Tim Holloway, Head of Engineering, Jordan Honda

"This circuit is all about establishing the right tyres for Sunday's race. We have completed some long runs this morning and been able to complete a lot of tyre work in race configuration. It has been good to make progress with the cars' set-ups and have a trouble-free session."

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