Kimi Raikkonen: “Overall, I’m reasonably pleased with the way things went in these three hours of free practice and the initial impressions are good. There is still room to improve the handling of the car, which we hope to do in tomorrow morning’s free practice. The new kerbs don’t allow you to cut them with impunity, which is not a bad thing given the difficulty we have experienced in this area in the past. Our pace on a long run isn’t bad and we will do our best to fight for a place on the podium. As for the tyres, the softer compound is definitely quicker, but it’s also quite consistent in terms of performance.”

Giancarlo Fisichella: “I feel satisfied with this first day, which was particularly tough from a driving point of view. The major difficulties are in adapting to the different positions of the buttons and gaining confidence with the KERS. This morning, braking heavily at Ascari, I flat-spotted the left front tyre and that meant I had to fit the softer tyres earlier than planned: I felt more confident with those and I managed to drive at a strong pace. In both sessions, we didn’t go looking for performance and I had a lot of fuel on board. The potential is there to get onto the front few rows, but I need a bit more time to improve, especially in terms of braking and cutting the kerbs.”

Image (c) Bridgestone Corporation

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