Hungarian GP Friday Tyrrell notes

HUNGARIAN GRAND PRIX PRACTISE [14.08.98] WET AND DRY THE ORDER OF THE DAY

HUNGARORING, BUDAPEST, HUNGARY August 14, 1998 -- Repeating a pattern seen at several recent Formula One races, it was the weather that once again dictated events during the first day of preparation for Sunday's Hungarian Grand Prix. In this case, though, the heavy rain shower that struck moments before Friday's opening session got underway may turn out to have been a blessing in disguise. Teams, including Tyrrell, had no choice but to go out on full-wet specification tyres, and although there were numerous off-track incidents as drivers discovered their limits and race engineers refined wet suspension settings, considerable useful information was gained in the process. This may be of particular importance if rain falls on race day. By comparison, Friday's afternoon session was run entirely in the dry, allowing Tyrrell drivers Toranosuke Takagi and Ricardo Rosset to conduct useful chassis set-up and tyre evaluation work.

TORANOSUKE TAKAGI (No 21) Position: 17th Best lap: 1:23.261 "It seemed like two days rolled into one as we started today in pouring rain on full wet tyres, ended the morning session on a drying track with intermediates, and then ran this afternoon in bright sunshine on normal grooved slicks. Our times may not look particularly brilliant, but I feel we have made good progress. We were able to do meaningful back-to-back runs with Goodyear's Prime and Option tyres this afternoon on race fuel with the result that we now have a good idea what our choice for the race will be. The car feels good in the latest high-downforce configuration and if we can hone the handling a little tomorrow, I will be happy."

RICARDO ROSSET (No 20) Position: 21st Best lap: 1:25.611 "Like just about everybody, I went off the track in this morning's wet conditions, fortunately without doing any damage to the car. This afternoon was better, and we made progress with the chassis balance, particularly under braking. The track surface was dirty and lacking in grip initially, but you could feel it get better as the day went on. Weather permitting, I think times will continue to improve tomorrow."

DR HARVEY POSTLETHWAITE, Managing Director, Tyrrell "'Set-up' is all important here at the Hungaroring, and getting a good chassis balance in these long corners and in changing conditions is a problem for the race engineers. It is exacerbated if the drivers have little experience of the track, as ours do. Nevertheless, we were able to do plenty of laps today and get a basis for the race settings."