10/05/2008
NEWS STORY
The Force India Formula One Team will start tomorrow's Turkish Grand Prix with Adrian Sutil and Giancarlo Fisichella in 19th and 20th positions respectively.
Despite the low qualifying slots, with under two seconds covering the field the team was satisfied with the performance given the relative competitivity of the car. With the three grid place penalty incurred yesterday Giancarlo will start from 20th position for tomorrow's race, while Adrian enjoyed a productive session that saw the team make a clear step forward from the practice pace for the first time this season.
With a stronger pace over a race distance, the team is looking forward to improving on the starting positions in tomorrow's 58-lap Grand Prix.
Adrian Sutil: 'Actually I had quite a good qualifying and we made a big improvement from practice. My car in the free practice had a few problems with the balance so we did a few changes between the sessions and it was better for the afternoon. On the last set of tyres I couldn't improve my time and didn't get the grip I expected and locked up into turn 12, but it was not so bad overall. From a performance perspective, to better to the practice pace and to get close to the rest of the field is positive.'
Giancarlo Fisichella: 'I did a clean lap and the team did a good job with the car. The balance is not bad, but we just need more grip and more downforce to move forward with the grid position. I am looking forward to a better race tomorrow.'
Mike Gascoyne, chief technical officer: 'I think in Giancarlo's case he got the most out of the car today considering his penalty. Adrian had a small lock up on his last run which cost him some time, but overall that is where the car is on this type of track. We've shown that our race pace can be more competitive than the one lap pace, so we can certainly look to race the cars in front of us tomorrow.'