By Karl King - FIA
July 31 2005

After driving a pretty flawless lap in qualifying to 3rd, Jarno Trulli was whisked off the the Quali Fastest Three Press Conference. Here's what the number 16 man had to say.

Q: Jarno, a great lap from where you went out in qualifying, you were seventh out, the track was a lot slower then, and here you are, top three for the sixth time this season.
Jarno TRULLI: Well, I am delighted about my lap and my qualifying considering I started very early in the session so the track was improving quite a lot. You also have to consider that this morning I missed quite a bit of practice, I didn’t use the new tyres so I didn’t know much about my car and the balance. It was a bit of a guess but I think I have done a pretty good lap. It is very good. Disappointing, because starting a bit later we could probably have fought for pole position, but anyway I am happy with the outcome of this qualifying.

Q: Very closely matched between you and Kimi Räikkönen, who was out first today, and equally Toyota have looked very strong all weekend.
JT: Yeah, our car has been looking pretty good over the weekend, especially over one lap on new tyres, but we will see tomorrow during the race with our strategy and our pace. But so far it has been pretty good.

Q: Jarno, you stopped out on the circuit this morning, that’s not going to penalise your grid position, so I understand. Would you just confirm that?
JT: Yes, I had a hydraulic problem so unfortunately I lost most of the most important session. I didn’t use the new tyres so I went out for qualifying without knowing much about track conditions and car balance. I had to guess a little bit but I think I guessed pretty well.

Q: In fact you have been pretty much up with the McLarens all weekend anyway, haven’t you?
JT: Well, I would say that our speed hasn’t been too bad this weekend, we have always been quite competitive, especially over one lap.

Q: And you will be starting from the clean side of the grid.
JT: Yes, that’s another good point which I hope I can use for the start and for the first corner. It will be very important to get away safely after the first corner in order to do a good race and in order to score some points.

Questions from the floor

Q: (Dusko Dragic - Ekipa) To all the drivers, how do you like the new suggestions for qualifying next year?
JPM: I would rather have four laps.

JT: Most of the drivers agree that it would be nice to have more than one lap in qualifying with no fuel, but it is not up to the drivers probably to decide what is the best and we will try to find a compromise in order to make a good show and to make everyone happy, the drivers, teams and especially the spectators.

MS: The main thing I keep saying is that there will not be any fix which will satisfy everyone. Unfortunately we all have different opinions and one likes one way, and the other one likes another way, spectators, drivers, team owners, whoever. The worst thing we can do is to keep on changing. That’s the only thing I can say about that.

Q: Will you be mentioning your preference to Max in your conversations?
MS: There is no point going into details of what we want to discuss or what we don’t want to discuss.

JT: We will discuss safety, that’s what it is all about.