Productive beginning for the Sauber squad
The weather conditions turned out to be rather nasty on Friday, the first day of the German Grand Prix in Hockenheim. Due to rain a photo call in the morning, commemorating the 40th anniversary of Sauber Motorsport, had to be postponed and in the first free practice session the track was wet for the entire session
The second 90 minute session allowed proper running on a dry track and saw Kamui Kobayashi and Pedro de la Rosa 11th and 13th .fastest respectively.
Kamui Kobayashi: C29.02 / Ferrari 056 1st Practice: 20th / 1:29.690 min (17 laps) / 2nd Practice: 11th / 1:17.336 min (44 laps) “It was a bit tricky for us that it was wet in the morning because we had a huge programme with the new components on the car, but still we got a lot of work done today. Braking for turn six, the hairpin, is the most difficult part on the wet track. The balance isn’t too bad, really, and we can improve it with some set-up changes. We definitely have to find something that enables us to make better use of the softer tyre compound. I don’t regard the difference between hard and super soft as a problem on this track.”
Pedro de la Rosa: C29.04 / Ferrari 056 1st Practice: 15th / 1:28.486 (23 laps) / 2nd Practice: 13th / 1:17.573 min (39 laps) “We had good runs in the wet this morning and now also good runs in dry conditions, which actually was a bonus because it was not expected to stay dry in free practice two. We know more or less what we need now. For me we have to improve the front end, and I think we can do this with some set up changes.”
James Key, Technical Director: “We haven’t been in the wet for a while, so we had to see where we were this morning on the full wet tyres which we started on, and then the intermediate tyres later in the session. It looked okay, and the drivers were happy with the car towards the end of the session, as the grip came back. In the second session we decided to go out early just in case it rained again. We did as much of the programme that was planned for the first session, but also combined this with the tyre tests. The session was fairly productive, and in general the drivers were happy with the car. There were some balance issues because of the general track conditions, but we have been able to cope with our set- up. The updates we’ve got seem to work as we expected, which is good.”
