BMW WilliamsF1 Team-Italian GP-Practice

Italian Grand Prix  -   FREE PRACTICE                    13th September 2002

Weather:  Overcast 20°C Air, 25° Track

On a productive and trouble free day, the BMW WilliamsF1 Team drivers Juan
Pablo Montoya and Ralf Schumacher were 5th and 7th respectively in the first
Free Practice sessions of the 2002 Italian Grand Prix in Monza.

Juan Pablo Montoya: 5th
Chassis: FW24 05
Best time: 1.23,584 min
"Overall I had good day.  I am happy with the balance of the car, which
gradually improved throughout the sessions.  The tyres behaved well which is
a very important factor on this circuit.  I think this is going to be an
interesting weekend for us, as we seem to be in quite a good shape on this
track."

Ralf Schumacher: 7th
Chassis: FW24 06 (T-Car FW24 02)
Best time: 1.24,115 min
"My practice session went quite well. There is still some work to do to
optimise the car, but overall I am confident.  A lot will depend on our tyre
choice.   This track is also hard on the brakes.  Before the first chicane
we brake down from around 350 km/h to approximately 70 km/h.  For the
drivers this is less extreme than it might appear from the outside.  Now we
are working on the set-up for qualifying."

Sam Michael (Chief Operations Engineer, WilliamsF1):
"It was a productive day in terms of working through some set-up changes,
and doing our work for Sunday on the tyre choice.  Michelin have brought two
quite different tyres to Monza and the challenge will be to get the grip in
qualifying.  It appears that Ferrari still has a big advantage on everybody
and we will be working overnight to minimise that.  We did not have any
mechanical failures."

Mario Theissen (BMW Motorsport Director):
"As usual to interpret Friday's result means speculation.  I just know that
we do not run in qualifying conditions during these sessions.  Both our
drivers have completed their programme according to plan. The set up work
for both the car and the engine was completed.  We had no technical problems
and feel confident for tomorrow's qualifying."