Super Aguri show their pace in tense qualifying

Super Aguri are happy with their performance at the end of the running season. While qualifying was tense, the final free practice session of the 2006 Brazilian Grand Prix saw Super Aguri F1's Takuma Sato setting a fastest lap time of 1:13.814 ahead of the Spyker MF1 Team, the Red Bull of David Coulthard and Jarno Trulli’s Toyota.

Weather: Warm and sunny (65-71% humidity)
Air Temperature: 20-22°C
Track Temperature: 33-41°C

Only 2.7 seconds separated the top and bottom of the time sheets at the end of Q1 during the afternoon’s Qualifying session, with Takuma and Sakon Yamamoto posting respectable times of 1:13.269 and 1:13.357 respectively.

“It was good to have a close and competitive qualifying at the end of the season. Today, in free practice, we made good progress that we carried over from yesterday and we were happy with the performance of the car. In qualifying we improved our lap time again, but it was unfortunate that we could not beat our nearest rivals. However, I believe that we have a good race car and that we are in a good position for tomorrow.”

“This morning we improved the balance of the car from our limited running yesterday and made good progress on the set-up for qualifying and the race tomorrow. I am happy with my qualifying result today because I feel that I have been able to show my potential without any problems for the first time since Monza, so I am very happy and I would like to thank everybody in the team.”

"Both SAF1 Team drivers did a great job today and their times were very close. I believe that our car is showing more of its true potential, but we still have a little way to go to match our nearest competitors. However, if you compare our times set today with those at the beginning of the season we have done a very good job. I would like to thank our mechanics, everyone at the factory, Honda and Bridgestone for their support this year and I hope that we can finish the season with a good result tomorrow.”