Belgian GP Friday Jaguar notes

This season the R1 has not been at its most effective on fast circuits, and despite a successful pre-race test at Silverstone last week, expectations were not high for Spa. After the morning session things had gone according to plan, and Johnny ...

This season the R1 has not been at its most effective on fast circuits, and despite a successful pre-race test at Silverstone last week, expectations were not high for Spa. After the morning session things had gone according to plan, and Johnny Herbert was the quicker of the two Jaguar R1s in 11th place. But in the later session, with a new set of tyres and a set-up change, Johnny had his most competitive run of the year and set the third quickest time.

'We started out this morning working on a particular set-up which was making the car a little better but not improving it significantly,” he said afterwards. “We changed strategy for this afternoon's session which was a real turning point. We put on a new set of tyres at the end of the session in order to check the balance for tomorrow and it felt really good. The job now is to keep that balance. It's definitely the best it's been for a while so I want to keep hold of it!"

The performance pleased technical director Gary Anderson, who hopes that the team will be able to repeat Johnny’s good performance in qualifying tomorrow. “We ran through our usual Friday programme and emerged with encouraging results,” he admitted. “Johnny has given us an indication of the balance of the car on new tyres which will be important for tomorrow. He provided some very constructive input and made a big step forward towards the end of the second session with a set-up change that we will put to good effect in qualifying.”