Italian GP Saturday Williams notes

Weather: Sunny and warm Average temperature 29 degrees

The positive weekend for the Winfield WilliamsF1 drivers continued today with the fourth and fifth positions on the grid achieved respectively by Alex Zanardi and Ralf Schumacher. This was the best qualifying position of the season for both drivers, even if Ralf had already achieved a fifth place two weeks ago, in Spa.

Alex Zanardi

Best Position: 4th Chassis: FW21 05 T-Car chassis FW21 02 Best Time: 1:23.432

"I am happy, of course and I want to thank the team as everybody worked very hard on the car which really improved throughout the weekend. It's evident. We are very pleased with this performance especially as we don't have a qualifying engine. Anyway, theoretically we shouldn't suffer for this disadvantage tomorrow, and I hope I will at least maintain this position in the race."

Ralf Schumacher

Best Position: 5th Chassis: FW21 06 Best Time: 1:23.636

"I was definitely happy with my car today and in the morning free practice session I felt it was sensibly better than yesterday. Unfortunately, during qualifying I was slowed down twice by yellow flags and therefore I could not get the best out of the third and especially the fourth runs, when I expected to be much faster. Anyway, the race is tomorrow and I am fairly optimistic that we will finish within a good place, starting from the second and third row."

Patrick Head, technical director

"It is obviously very pleasing to have our best individual and team positions so far this year mostly for Alex and particularly at this circuit, where there is a fantastic atmosphere. Now we look forward to a good race and we think we can perform well although we have a couple of cars behind us who could cause us some worries."