FIRST FREE PRACTICE NEWS:
In the opening practice session for Sunday's San Marino Grand Prix run under warm blue skies the Scuderia-Ferrari-Marlboro driver Michael Schumacher and Eddie Irvine were working hard to try and match the performance of the McLaren and Williams cars at this circuit.
Eddie Irvine , who was trying the new tower mid-wings on his chassis ended the session in a gravel trap after spinning off into turn 6 and stalling the engine. The same corner caught out Michael Schumacher, but he managed to keep his Ferrari rolling across the gravel trap and rejoined the track at the exit of the corner. Ferrari will have more tower wings tomorrow and Schumacher will probably try them.
Both cars have a revised front suspension geometry , but not he overhead exhaust system for reliability after the car suffered a cracked pipe during testing. Schumacher ended up in fifth spot on the time sheets, Irvine back in ninth place, although more worrying was that Schumacher's best lap was 2,3 seconds off the pace of the fastest car. He was working mainly on race set-up and the chassis set-up experiencing some trouble with locking front brakes at one stage.
It looks as though the two McLaren-Mercedes driver Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard will be the men to beat at Imola, Hakkinen just one tenth of a second ahead of his team-mate Coulthard for the fastest times of the session, although the two Williams driver, Villeneuve and Frentzen were over a second off their pace. The wet weather during testing last week did not allow the team to try all the changes they had hoped to use at this race, but there are some minor aerodynamic changes since the last race. Both drivers had a trouble free morning.
Despite some sideways moments and a couple of trips across the grass, Jacques Villeneuve described his Williams-Mecachrome at Imola as, " not as spectacular as it looks." As the fastest of the Goodyear team he described the handling of his car as "not bad" and will work on fine tuning it during the day. Heinz Harald Frentzen was fourth fastest, Williams engineer James Robinson saying that he thought the team had progressed with finding the best set-up following four days of testing in Jerez last week.
Giancarlo Fisichella set the pace for the Benetton team at his home circuit with the sixth fastest time , the Italian apparently suffering no after effects of a big road accident on Tuesday evening while driving his Porsche Boxter. He left the road trying to avoid a truck from a side road and was lucky to escape unhurt when his car was destroyed against a tree. Alexander Wurz was back in 13th place after working on his car's set-up.
Riccardo Rosset only ran four laps before his Tyrrell stopped on the track with suspected electrical problems. Both Jordan drivers are running a longer wheelbase version of their cars here after tests in Silverstone last week proved positive. Ralf Schumacher was back in 17th place after delays caused by an hydraulic leak.Both Mika Salo (Arrows) and Rubens Barrichello (Stewart) were delayed by gearbox trouble. Jean Alesi complained of understeer from his Sauber, while Herbert was happier, delighted that this was his first session without a problem since Brazil.
SECOND FREE PRACTICE SESSION:
Michael Schumacher turned up his practice pace in the second free time practice session to-day to move ahead of the two Williams drivers and close to within four-tenth's of a second Mika Hakkinen's quickest McLaren-Mercedes time. He didn't get all the programme he had planned finished during the session in which he set his best time on fresh tyres. He was quite happy with the progress the team had made throughout the day. Eddie Irvine continued running his car with the new tower wings mounted on the side-pod and ended up seventh fastest for the day.
Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard continued to hold the fastest times of the day by the end of the second free practice session, Mika Hakkinen pushing his McLaren to the limit with a spectacular trip across the gravel trap on one corner, but got way with only minor side-pod damage. He improved a couple of tenth's of a second over his morning time , but David Coulthard was unable to improve after finishing the session early when the team stopped him running because of a suspected engine problem.
Although Jacques Villeneuve managed to improve his morning time by over half a second he had to settle for fourth fastest time of the day six-tenth's of a second outside Schumacher's best. Heinz- Harald Frentzen slipped back to 10th place this afternoon when he was forced to park his Williams after just 15 minutes due to a leaking oil pipe which sprayed on onto the hot exhaust causing a lot of smoke.
Despite a mistake just before the end of the session which saw Ralf Schumacher spin his Jordan on the last corner , the young German put up another good showing to take the fifth fastest time of the day. "The car feels good and fifth to seventh place on the grid is a realistic position for qualifying if all goes well," he said. Damon Hill was a lot happier with his longer wheel-base Jordan. "It makes the car more consistent and thus easier to set up," said Hill, who set the ninth fastest time.
Giancarlo Fisichella claimed that his Benetton was still a little too nervous at the rear for his liking, but managed the sixth fastest time. Alexander Wurz was unable to better 13th best complaining of traffic when he tried to set a time on fresh tyres.
Pedro Diniz parked his Arrows on the track with a suspected gearbox problem , the same fault thought to have been the reason why Jarno Trulli parked his Prost half way through the session. Both Stewart drivers were frustrated at not being able to find a good set-up for the chassis. Tiger Takagi was in and out of the pits with electrical problems with his Tyrrell , but still set an impressive 14th fastest , his team-mate Rosset the slowest of the day despite a good run in the afternoon. Herbert keeps tower wings. Johnny Herbert tried his Sauber with and without the tower wings on the side pods. He set his time without them, but found his car more comfortable to drive with them.
SAN MARINO GP - FRIDAY PRACTICE TIMES, ACCUMULATED
Pos Driver Nat Team
1 M.Hakkinen FIN McLaren-Mercedes MP4/13 1:27.617
2 D.Coulthard GBR McLaren-Mercedes MP4/13 1:27.940
3 M.Schumacher GER Ferrari F300 1:28.088
4 J.Villeneuve CAN Williams-Mecachrome FW20 1:28.644
5 R.Schumacher GER Jordan-Mugen-Honda 198 1:28.891
6 G.Fisichella ITA Benetton-Mecachrome B198 1:28.963
7 E.Irvine GBR Ferrari F300 1:29.028
8 O.Panis FRA Prost-Peugeot AP01 1:29.175
9 D.Hill GBR Jordan-Mugen-Honda 198 1:29.246
10 H.H.Frentzen GER Williams-Mecachrome FW20 1:29.470
11 J.Alesi FRA Sauber-Petronas C17 1:29.516
12 M.Salo FIN Arrows A19 1:29.828
13 A.Wurz AUT Benetton-Mecachrome B198 1:29.864
14 T.Takagi JPN Tyrrell-Ford 026 1:30.190
15 J.Herbert GBR Sauber-Petronas C17 1:30.223
16 P.Diniz BRA Arrows A19 1:30.795
17 J.Trulli ITA Prost-Peugeot AP01 1:30.804
18 R.Barrichello BRA Stewart-Ford SF2 1:30.849
19 E.Tuero ARG Minardi-Ford M198 1:31.954
20 S.Nakano JPN Minardi-Ford M198 1:32.052
21 J.Magnussen DNK Stewart-Ford SF2 1:32.196
22 R.Rosset BRA Tyrrell-Ford 026 1:32.554
All Timing Unofficial