Turkish GP: Super Aguri Friday practice notes

Super Aguri F1 Team third driver Franck Montagny returned to the Friday Free Practice sessions today following the introduction of the third SA06 chassis. The team experienced only one minor gearbox issue during FP1 and all three SAF1 Team drivers successfully completed their planned programmes for the day.

Franck Montagny:

"First of all 'thanks' to the mechanics because I know that the car arrived late and that they worked overnight to prepare it. Unfortunately this morning we had problems so we could not set up the car correctly and this afternoon we had a lot of work to do on the tyres."

"To start with I was not too happy about the set-up of the car as it was very nervous, but we didn't really have time to work on it, so we did a good job considering that. Two hours running is always a little bit too short, but I'm happy to be back driving with the team and to give some information and feedback that I hope will be useful for the weekend."

Takuma Sato:

"It was a very important day for us; to shakedown the SA06. We did not encounter any major problems, which is great. Franck completed a respectable amount of running with a few set-up changes and collected valuable tyre data. I was relying on that as I did not run in the first session, as we had planned."

"During the second session we ran the normal installation lap to check that everything was okay and then ran through our planned programme. The car seems to be working well and if everything is okay when we look at the SA06's data tonight, we will continue to update the car tomorrow."

Sakon Yamamoto:

"Today was a good start for this race weekend for me. It was the first time for me to drive the circuit but I was able to learn the layout quickly this morning. During this afternoon's session we worked on improving our set-up and I am happy with the result so I think that we are ready for tomorrow."

Aguri Suzuki, Team Principal:

"I am very happy with the debut of the third SA06. Franck did a very good job today. During the afternoon session he set a competitive time and provided us with a good amount of data from the new car. Both Takuma and Sakon set times above the Midland's, so overall it has been a good day for the team."

Franck Montagny
Chassis: SA06-02
FP1 Position: 16th
No. of Laps: 13
Best Lap Time 1:31.814
FP2 Position: 16th
No. of Laps: 25
Best Lap Time: 1:30.491

Takuma Sato
Chassis: SA06-03
FP1 Position: 24th
No. of Laps: 1
Best Lap Time: No Timed Lap
FP2 Position: 24th
No. of Laps: 11
Best Lap Time: 1:31.091

Sakon Yamamoto
Chassis: SA06-04
FP1 Position: 18th
No. of Laps: 11
Best Lap Time: 1:31.212
FP2 Position: 25th
No. of Laps: 21
Best Lap Time: 1:31.316

-credit: super aguri