German GP: Jordan Saturday qualifying notes

Giorgio Pantano and Nick Heidfeld qualified 17th and 18th for the German Grand Prix. Pantano missed most of morning free practice after he hit a bollard early in the first session which damaged the front wing and sent him careering into the tyre barriers. With the car badly damaged and insufficient time for the car to be repaired before practice ended, Pantano and his engineers were forced to make set-up choices based on existing data.

Giorgio Pantano:

"I'm quite satisfied but a little worried about missing practice this morning because we didn't have the opportunity to check our race set-up so I don't know how the car will be tomorrow. We went with our set-up and I didn't know how it would turn out this afternoon, I just did my best and as it happened the balance was alright and I did a good lap."

Nick Heidfeld:

"I'm happy with my lap, and qualifying was better than pre-qualifying. We had a bit of front tyre graining towards the end of the lap but it wasn't a big issue. I think I am in fairly good shape for the race tomorrow. The work we did this morning showed that on long runs our tyres have promising performance with no major degradation."

James Robinson, Head of race and test engineering:

"We saw good laps from both drivers and especially Giorgio, given the problems he had after a small `off' this morning and the consequent loss of running in free practice. Well done to the boys for getting his car back together. Before qualifying we detected a small clutch problem with Nick's car and the mechanics worked very hard to rectify that before he went out. It was a busy day for Jordan Ford but it went smoothly when it mattered."

Giorgio Pantano
Chassis: EJ14/02
17th, 1:16.192

Nick Heidfeld
Chassis: EJ14/03
18th, 1:16.310

-jordan-