Fernando Alonso and
Felipe Massa both completed well over a Japanese Grand
Prix race distance (118 laps: 57 for the Spaniard and
four more for the Brazilian), equivalent to 685
kilometres, during the three hours of free practice at
the spectacular Suzuka circuit yesterday.
Even if the season is
reaching the end of the road, every moment of track time
is still invaluable to Scuderia Ferrari, as it chases
its twin objectives of ending the year more stylishly
than it began it and cramming in as much work as
possible in the light of starting all over again in
2012.
The Spaniard ended the day in an encouraging second
place on the time sheet, behind the McLaren of Jenson
Button, who was the only man to break the 1m 32s
barrier. The Scuderia’s Brazilian driver was fifth
fastest this afternoon, separated from his team-mate by
just under four tenths of a second and the two Red Bulls
of third placed Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber in
fourth. Felipe’s former team-mate and multiple Suzuka
winner Michael Schumacher completed the top six for
Mercedes.
In past years, by the time the teams reached Suzuka, the
scene was set and, to quote Julius Caesar as he crossed
the Rubicon, the die is cast. However, this year the one
predictable element of each race has been its
unpredictability and yet again that might well prove to
be the case this weekend. One can expect the unexpected
and as usual, the relative performance of the Pirelli
Soft and Medium tyres and how the teams manage their use
on Sunday would seem to be the key. But we are getting
ahead of the game, because before the race comes one
more hour of free practice tomorrow morning, followed by
qualifying: if the tyres, combined with DRS and KERS
make overtaking a bit more likely on this track where
getting ahead of a rival has always been very difficult,
Suzuka is still the sort of circuit where having a clear
view of the run down to the first right hander is more
than useful.
Fernando Alonso: “This year we have
seen all the teams go through so many highs and lows,
with the exception of Red Bull, depending on which track
we are at, so we should not be too surprised if today it
seems that we have done better than in Singapore for
example. And then, today is only Friday: it’s happened
before that the first day has been like this and then we
have not managed to do any better than fifth in
qualifying. In fact, I don’t think that things are so
different to what they were two weeks ago, especially as
our cars are pretty much unchanged. We hope to be able
to fight with McLaren and Red Bull, but we know it won’t
be easy. What we can say is that the feeling from today
is a little bit more encouraging than in previous races.
Also, we must bear in mind that the races have been much
more open than in the past, when the final result did
not differ that much from the grid positions: strategy,
tyre degradation and DRS create much more uncertainty
and spectacle. For example, I think that here we will
see a lot more overtaking than in past years.”
Felipe Massa: “Overall, it was a good
day: compared to so many other Fridays this year, the
first impressions are better. The car behaved reasonably
well, but it’s also true we will not know where we are
compared to the others until tomorrow afternoon. We
worked a lot on defining the best set-up, learning
important things for the rest of the weekend. Tyre
degradation seems to be rather significant, which will
make the race even more open in terms of strategy:
finding the right set-up on the car won’t be the easiest
of jobs. Maybe we can fight for a podium finish and it’s
a realistic goal. Sure, I always want to be able to
fight for the win: it’s true that Red Bull has a
significant advantage, but we must continue to believe
in ourselves, because in the races, anything can
happen.”
Pat Fry: “It is always difficult to
evacuate precisely the relative strengths through the
field on Friday evening, because we do not know exactly
what our main opponents were doing, especially when it
comes to the fuel loads they ran during the three hours
of free practice. Therefore, it’s better to concentrate
on our own efforts and try and prepare as well as
possible for the rest of the weekend. We had various
different aerodynamic elements to compare and that was
the bulk of what we did in the first session. It’s
important also when looking to next year, because it
means you can go into greater detail when it comes to
the correlation between the track and the wind tunnel.
This afternoon, tyres were the dominant item during the
ninety minutes: this track is very tough on tyres and it
will be some challenge to find the right balance on the
car, both for qualifying and the race.”