Ferrari Is In The Pound Seats For The US GP


By DCX
June 19 2005

Because of the Michelin debacle, Ferrari is sitting in the pound seats, for tomorrow's United States Grand Prix. Michael Schumacher qualified 5th and Rubens Barrichello was slighty further back in 7th.

Badoer Prepares Ferrari

Ferrari Is In The Pound Seats For The US GP

DCX
Michael Schumacher
Q: 5th - 1.11'369

Michael Schumacher continued his consitancy today, as he set the fifth fastest time during qualifying for the United States Grand Prix. Michelin's complicated tyre situation has given Schumacher a huge advantage as well. Since Michelin is going to have to change their tyres to the new set being flown in, Ferrari is counting on Michelin being sent to the back or at least for them to be unprepared. Because of this, Ferrari put a substantial amount of fuel in their cars, to be able to get far in front of the Michelin runners as the race progresses. The high fuel loads also showed that Ferrari is very competitive as they posted quite decent times. Here is what the 7-Time World Champion had to say about his qualifying run In Indianapolis:

“I am quite happy with my qualifying performance and actually, fifth place is better than fourth on this grid as the other side is dirtier. Although I am not really sure why, it was already clear yesterday that we seem to be more competitive here than at some of the other tracks we have visited this year. I hope that we will find out tomorrow that we qualified with a heavier fuel load than our rivals, or at least closer in terms of fuel load than we were in Canada and I am hopeful of finishing on the podium tomorrow. As for Ralf, I spoke to him this morning and I think the decision not to race is the right one.”

Rubens Barrichello
Q:7th - 1.11'431

Rubens Barrichello, like Michael, is set to capitalize on Michelin's rather bizzare situation. Rubens set the 7th fastest time, and if Michelin is forced to the back of the grid, he will start second alongside Michael. This would also mean that the incredibly slow Jordans and Minardis will be between them and the other competitive teams, causing havoc for those behind the slow cars. Here is what the Brazilian had to say after his session:

“I think we had a good qualifying, even if we could have done a bit better. However, a place on the fourth row is not that bad, as it is possible to overtake at this track. I expect that, as we have seen so far, we will be stronger in the race. That has been our strong point this season and also in the past at this circuit.”

Ross Brawn
Technical Director

Ferrari's Technical Director Ross Brawn, is quite confident that today's very good qualifying session will combine with Ferrari's high fuel load strategy will yield a victory for the team. Here is what Ross had to say about the qualifying session:

“We are reasonably happy with qualifying, Once again, we know we don’t quite have the performance level over a single lap, but the Bridgestone tyres were very consistent in this morning’s practice, so we can look forward to a good race. We just have to hope our drivers don’t get stuck behind anyone at the start, because if Kimi makes a break at the front and we are trapped, it could be difficult. We can have a strong race and we have a good strategy for tomorrow.”

June 18, 2005

Find out how Ferrari has improved so much on the Ferrari 1 Message Board.

Bookmark or share this story with:

 

Ferrari F1 latest threads