Formula One news

Toyota drivers make it into top ten again

The Toyota team is moving forward. After having a difficult start of the season the team is now back in the top ten on a regular basis. Jarno Trulli and Ralf Schumacher qualified themselves for Sunday's race in 8th and 9th respectively.

Qualifying started under blue skies in warm conditions, with track temperatures of 35°C, and both drivers easily progressed beyond Q1, with Jarno 10th, one place ahead of Ralf. Q2 saw both Toyotas in the top 10 but it was not without drama for Jarno, who spun at the Veedol Chicane in the final seconds. However, his earlier lap time was sufficient and he lined up just behind Ralf in the pit lane as the drivers waited for the green light in Q3. They had more waiting to do when the red flags came out with five minutes remaining, signalling a delay of over half an hour. When the session finally resumed, Jarno set the 8th fastest time, with Ralf in 9th, giving both drivers a platform from which to fight for points in the race tomorrow.

Jarno Trulli commented on his qualifying session: "It was a difficult qualifying session. We both did a reasonably good job and I think we are in good shape for the race. We will keep working hard but having two cars in the top 10 is not too bad. The first session went well and we had no trouble getting through. As you could see, I had a spin on my last flying lap in Q2 at the chicane but luckily it did not matter and we got into the top 10 again. The red flag in Q3 didn't really affect me. It is part of our job - when I saw Lewis get out of the car, I could just forget it straight away. Obviously there is quite a lot of work to do to fight the cars ahead of us but from where we are on the grid, we have a good chance of scoring points again."

Ralf Schumacher was fairly satisfied with his top ten result. He commented: "The session went quite well for me today and getting into the top 10 is positive. We would have liked to have finished a bit higher but eighth and ninth is still okay. We knew it was going to be difficult to get both cars in the top 10 but the car feels quite good and I am reasonably happy with today's performance. It felt like we had a decent balance throughout the session and we had no problems with the car, so that was good. I am happy to be on the clean side of the grid for the start tomorrow - hopefully we can make a strong start because there are cars in front of us which I think we can catch. We will see how it goes but I am hopeful."

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