04.09.2004 "Gollin was simply fantastic and I do not have enough words for the team to explain my satisfaction" BMS Scuderia Italia FIA GT qualifying report from Imola

Fabrizio Gollin this afternoon muscled a Care Racing owned Ferrari 550 Maranello with 100kg of success ballast around the 4.9km Imola track into pole position for tomorrow’s three hour FIA GT race.

The Brescia-based team were full of awe and congratulations for the impressively fast 29-year-old from Castelfranco Veneto, who is a part-time instructor at the Porsche Italia racing school based here at Imola.

His team-mate and joint leader in the drivers’ Championship points race, Luca Cappellari, was the first to claim him “unbelievable!”

The quickest times for nearly all competitors were set during the first of the two qualifying sessions today. Both were held in extremely hot and humid conditions, a forecast due to hold over the weekend and which will make tyre choice and wear a critical issue.

BMS Scuderia Italia’s Team Manager, Tiziano Minuti: “It was a maximum performance from the team today because we have 100kg on two cars. Gollin was simply fantastic and I do not have enough words for the team to explain my satisfaction.”

BMS Scuderia Italia car no. 1 - Matteo Bobbi: “Fabrizio did an unbelievably fantastic lap here – with 55 kg more weight than us! I thought we had done well, and I couldn’t believe it when I saw the time he set.

"Psychologically I have to try and put that behind me and aim for as many points as possible in the race to close the gap in the Drivers’ points table. Today was not a good day for me.”

BMS Scuderia Italia car no. 2 – Fabrizio Gollin: “It was a fantastic lap and I think it is down to one main thing. Yesterday we found a really good set up for our very heavy car [with 100kg of ballast] and we now have a car which makes it possible for us to not only ride the kerbs well for a quick lap in qualifying but also to race well, which was our main objective. I am a bit surprised we were so quick but I think it was really a perfect lap!”   

Care Racing Development car no. 3 – Stefano Livio: “I’m not very happy as I had a lot of problems yesterday in practice, brakes and the red flag for example, which didn’t allow me the opportunity to run with new tyres and to fully test the car. So today I had to try and find a good time without any references on the track.

"I knew I could improve this afternoon [from the time set this morning] and had a second set of tyres to use. The first part of the lap was very good but then I found a lot of traffic so couldn’t finish it as I had started."