Saturday: Kovalainen brings a smile to Team Lotus
If Jarno Trulli is entangled in various mechanical issues (gearbox, power steering...), his teammate Heikki Kovalainen demonstrates the real potential of the green and yellow single-seater.
Heikki Kovalainen – 18th and 18th
I’m really satisfied with today’s performance. We really exploited the best of the car and managed to break the 1s 42 per lap barrier, which is very satisfying. I’m quite amazed by our fast lap and I think we know where we stand for race pace, which gives us another chance to finish strong tomorrow. I’m also looking forward to Brazil where we have a rear wing update coming, which should give us a better chance to use the DRS more effectively in qualifying, helping us to be closer to our race pace on Saturday afternoon. Another fast lap like this, but in Brazil with the update, would be a great way to end the qualifying sessions this season.
Jarno Trulli – 24th and 19th
It’s obviously a tricky day for me, having had little time in FP3 where we discovered a gearbox problem that couldn’t be fixed in time to allow me to run in that session. Despite this, the team worked well to solve the problem and gave me the chance to go out in qualifying without incurring any penalties, and thus by realizing a lap that keeps me comfortably ahead of the guys behind is, in these circumstances, pretty good news.
Mike Gascoyne – Chief Engineer
A rather satisfactory qualifying session for us. Obviously, Jarno had a bit of ground to make up after losing this morning’s session with a gearbox problem that we were able to fix in time for qualifying. Heikki had another very good qualifying performance in Q1 and extracted all the performance from the car. The key now is to maintain the pace we’ve been showing since Singapore and ensure we finish the race without any issues.
