Brazil

A1 Team Brasil suffered a disappointing qualifying today at the Sentul circuit for the Indonesian round of the 2006/07 World Cup of Motorsport. After a weekend that has so far seen the team struggling to find a good set-up, Tuka Rocha was only able to qualify in 19th position, securing a tenth row start for tomorrow morning's sprint race.

This morning's final one-hour practice session actually saw Tuka finish fifth in the standings, with a fastest time of 1:18.367, but this was set on new tyres compared to most drivers running on old. It was also not to be indicative of a qualifying position once the rest of the grid fixed new rubber to their cars, and with the team unable to improve the performance of the car between the practice and qualifying sessions, Tuka struggled from the off.

He set his quickest laps of 1:18.251 and 1:18.483 in the second and third segments, giving him a combined time of 2:36.734. This put him a disappointing 19th in the standings heading into segment four, as he was lapping almost two seconds slower than the frontrunners. The team fitted new tyres for the final attack to try to elevate Tuka in the provisional grid order, however, as Tuka began his final flying lap, he was blocked by Team Canada's Sean McIntosh, who was on his outlap. The move saw Tuka's lap time tumble into the 1:20's, leaving him unable to improve on 19th.

Tuka Rocha: "We had new tyres in practice this morning when I set my fastest lap so it was not a true position which we knew. But I didn't expect it to be so bad in qualifying. I just couldn't get anymore out of the car. We were setting the same times as in practice this morning, but it just shows that we really need to improve. We had the problem with Canada blocking us on the last lap when I was on new tyres, which didn't help, but we need to develop this car."

Emerson Fittipaldi, Team Principal: "I've only just arrived at the circuit today so I haven't been involved in the meetings so far, but I am very disappointed that we didn't have the right set-up and that we were blocked by Team Canada on our last qualifying lap. The guy didn't look in the mirror and Tuka was there on new tyres for his final lap so we lost out there. But the car set-up is not looking great and we have to improve the whole team. We're two seconds off and that is something that seriously needs to be solved."

Canada

Sean McIntosh secured a fifth-row grid slot for A1 Team Canada on Saturday with a ninth place effort in qualifying ahead of Sunday's fifth round of the 2006-07 A1GP World Cup of Motorsport, hosted at the Sentul International Circuit in Indonesia.

Returning to the 4.12km track where he scored Canada's only A1GP victory to-date with a stunning last-to-first drive back in February, McIntosh was again a front-runner in qualifying holding a top-ten position throughout the session. Battling the heat and humidity, as well as 20 rival nations for the pole, Sean's first qualifying lap, a 1m17.344s, saw him up into ninth place.

Slower on his second run, this time on old rubber, the 21-year-old from Vancouver slapped on a new set of Cooper tires for his third outing, posting a flying 1m17.274s – the sixth fastest lap of the third sector. Sean's first and third laps would ultimately be used to set his aggregate qualifying time, 2m34.608s as he was later penalized by A1GP stewards, with the subsequent exclusion of his fourth sector lap time, for allegedly blocking A1 Team Brazil's Tuka Rocha exiting the pits.

Rocha had in turn blocked the Canadian on his final, potentially faster run, but McIntosh's penalty would negate his fourth lap irrespective of time although he held onto ninth on the grid for Sunday's Sprint race, the results of which then determine the starting order for the Feature race. New Zealand's Jonny Reid snatched P1 from last season's Indonesian pole-sitter, Great Britain's Robbie Kerr, in the dying stages of a thrilling qualifying session.

"It wasn't the best qualifying performance,' stated McIntosh afterwards. "I thought our pace in practice on old tires was going to convert into a better grid slot but it wasn't the case. We didn't start from the front last season when we won and we know we have a good, consistent race car here. If I can maximize that fact then I'm sure we can have another productive Sunday afternoon at Sentul."

China

After a good start in the first two Official Practices, A1 Team China Rookie driver Ho-Pin Tung started his 3rd Official Practice in the morning. Ho-Pin still has lot to learn about this comparatively heavy A1 car, he braked too hard in the 4th corner, which caused a lot of troubles to A1 Teams, and there was a hole on the front right tyre, then he lost last 15 minutes of practice.

A1 Team China has 3 sets of new tyres in the Qualifying, Ho-Pin made a mistake in turn 4 again and lost some time, then he only got 1:17.873 in the first session, about 1.21 seconds behind the fastest German driver. Ho-Pin used the same set of tyres in the 2nd session in the Qualifying, this time he did not make any mistakes and finished in sixth place of the session. In the following session, Ho-Pin was very fast in the first half of the track, unfortunately he was blocked by other A1 Team and lost his chance to get into top 10 of the list. In the last session, Ho-Pin made his second quickest lap time, and end up with 12th in the Qualifying.

Ho-Pin Tung said after the Qualifying: "It was a very disappointing Qualifying, again I did not manage the turn 4 very well in the first session. Then every time I switch my foot between pedals I step on both pedals a bit. Our team will get it fixed by tomorrow, it is not a big problem."