iSport International - Bruno Senna (Pole) Karun Chandhok (10th)

Bruno Senna recorded iSport's first pole position of the campaign - and the first of his GP2 Series career - during today's qualifying session at Magny-Cours, France. It was not, however, a conventional pole lap. The Brazilian, who swept into the championship lead in Monaco last month, crashed as he completed a 1m 25.250s lap towards the end of the half-hour session. He was in mid-accident as he crossed the finishing line, but his time was still good enough to put him at the head of the 26-car field.

His team-mate Karun Chandhok was unable to get his car tailored to his liking and ended the day in 10th place.

Bruno Senna: "I'm obviously delighted to take pole, but that wasn't quite how I'd planned to do it. The car was really well balanced today - perfect, in fact - but every time I tried to put a lap together I was delayed by traffic. When it came to my final run I just gave it everything I had and, unfortunately, the car got away from me at the final chicane. It was my last chance to set a really good time and the incident was just one of those things. The car felt absolutely fantastic and I'm now in a perfect position to capitalise on that."

Karun Chandhok: "I'm not sure what happened there. I'm disappointed to be 10th and can't really put my finger on the problem. I just didn't feel hooked up and never had sufficient confidence in the car to attack the circuit in the way I'd have liked. We'll sit down and look at the data this evening, but this is a good team that always comes up with good answers, so I'm sure we'll be in better shape tomorrow."

Racing Engineering - Giorgio Pantano (3rd) Javier Villa (24th)

There were mixed fortunes today for the two Racing Engineering drivers with Giorgio Pantano qualifying an impressive 3rd but Javier Villa could only manage the 24th fastest time.

Both drivers made an excellent start to the day in this morning's Free Practice when Javier was on fantastic form to set the third fastest time of 1m 22.874s, less than two tenths of a second behind the fastest driver. Giorgio was similarly as competitive setting the fourth best time in 1m 22.892s, just two tenths of a second behind his team mate. It was clear that all the hard work carried out by the Spanish team and their two drivers at the recent Paul Ricard tests was paying off.

With such fast times in the morning both drivers were looking forward to the afternoon's 30 minute qualifying session confident that their Racing Engineering Dallaras were as fast as any of the other cars on the track.

Giorgio Pantano continued his excellent performance in the afternoon and at the end of qualifying he had set the third quickest time in his Repsol/Telefónica supported car. His fastest lap of 1m 22.301s was only 0.051seconds away from the pole position time and indeed, following a red flag incident resulting from an accident to Bruno Senna, the Italian driver set the fastest time in the first two sectors of the lap but a small mistake in the final sector cost him pole position.

For Javier Villa it was not such a good result, the good setup he had for the morning session did not suit the warmer track conditions in the afternoon and the young Spaniard could only set a time of 1m 23.998s for 24th on the grid.

For tomorrow's Feature Race Giorgio Pantano is clearly capable of taking a podium position and a win is a real possibility as his car is very competitive on the Magny Cours track and the Racing Engineering team have an enviable reputation for reliability this season. Meanwhile for Javier the team will be looking to improve the setup on his car so that Javi can push as hard as possible to try and get a good grid position for Sunday's Sprint Race.

Alfonso de Orleans Borbón (team principal): "A strange qualifying for us. Giorgio did a fantastic job and I am sure he would have had pole without his little error in the last corner. On the other hand, after Javi's fantastic time this morning, it's a pity that he wasn't able to replicate this in qualifying. Hopefully tomorrow he will be able to fight back to allow him to have a good starting position for Sunday. Once again, everyone in the team did a great job and now we have to prepare for tomorrow's race."

Javier Villa: "I don't really know what has happened. In free practice we went really, really quick. Now in qualifying the track was very different as it was much warmer. The set up we had was not the perfect one for these conditions. We have to now check everything as we don't want to be in the same situation in case we encounter the same conditions tomorrow."

Giorgio Pantano: "I am trying to do the best I can everywhere to put all my best sectors in one lap. In the last lap I was heading for pole, but I couldn't take the last corner perfect. In the end I am 0.051 seconds off pole, which disturbs me a lot, but I know that we have a fast car and I will go for the win tomorrow."

DAMS - Kamui Kobayashi (7th) Jérôme d'Ambrosio (13th)

Today, DAMS competed in free practice and qualifying for the fourth round of the 2008 GP2 Series Championship on the Magny-Cours circuit. Jérôme d'Ambrosio and Kamui Kobayashi made maximum use of the 30-minute free session in the morning to fine-tune their set-up. They finished in 12th and 13th positions.