Brazilian GP Friday Prost notes

Hard work paying off
Brazilian GP - Prost - Practice report

Jean Alesi completed 39 laps in today's free practice finishing both sessions in a strong sixth place. Alesi had three spins and two off-course excursions during the first session with the last off seeing him lose the car's front wing. He also complained of too much heat in the cockpit.

"I am very happy for the whole team because all the hard work we have done is starting to pay off," said a pleased Jean Alesi. "For us, it is the start of some real development now. This weekend is certainly going to be better than the one in Melbourne. It is the true signal that better things will follow. The Interlagos circuit remains as exhausting as ever and the changes made to the surface have not done very much about the bumps, in particular on the main straight in front of the stands where the cars bottom very much. But I am very confident after today that we are going in the right direction."

Nick Heidfeld had engine problems during the first session and gearbox problems keeping him in the pits for much of the second. He only managed 19 laps when he was aiming to try and learn his way around the circuit.

"Obviously, I am disappointed to complete only 19 laps after having some serious problems, firstly with the engine, which we changed between the sessions, in the morning and then secondly with the gearbox this afternoon," he explained. "All this meant, naturally, that I was not able to do any work on the set-up of the car at all and it was also not enough track time for me to learn my way around the circuit. It looks nice, but I don't really know it, so I just hope I get to know it better tomorrow!"

"The whole team should be satisfied with the work done recently since we have been able to identify the problems which worried us before," added Alain Prost. "Clearly, our lack of testing mileage was the source of our difficulties. We have had a very constructive day with Jean. We had no serious problems and this allowed us for the first time to really work on the car. Unfortunately, this morning, like this afternoon, we had a lot of problems which prevented Nick from working properly. This is sad for him at the time when he wanted to learn the circuit. He began the first session with the spare car, but after seven laps we had to change the engine. This afternoon, the gearbox had a mechanical problem. We are sorry we could not take full advantage of this first day of free practice and we will do our best to improve things and give him a good car tomorrow. Jean is very happy with the behaviour of the chassis and it is encouraging for us to be able to test some new things, which we had not tried before. The potential is clearly here and this gives us the boost to do our utmost this weekend. "