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Ireland sets early pace in China |
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Friday, 14 December 2007 |
Zhuhai, China, 14th December 2007: Adam Carroll made a fantastic debut on new soil
ending the
day fastest for Ireland, half a second clear of his closest rival, as
the A1GP World Cup of
Motorsport took to the Zhuhai International Circuit
in China for the first time.
After a steady rookie session this morning, including time spent learning the new track,
Belmayne
A1 Team Ireland was eager to get back out on track this afternoon.
Adam did not disappoint, getting straight on the pace, putting in a flying lap of
1:23.279 on lap
three on fresh rubber. His time was never beaten, with only Canada
getting close, 0.492s adrift.
After putting in such a competitive time so early on the
team was able to concentrate on race set
up and making sure they were fully
prepared ahead of qualifying tomorrow. The Ireland squad
were in positive
form after a brilliant day saw them back on top where the results reflected the
hard work put in by everybody involved.
Adam Carroll: “It’s been a good start to the weekend but it’s only practice. I got a
good time on
new rubber and although I’m sure everyone will be pushing to catch up
tomorrow, I’m hoping we
can carry the pace all the way through the weekend. The
track tarmac is quite abrasive so half
way through the sessions your tyres are
gone and you can’t really do anything else. You can get
only one or two good
laps out the tyres, so the first lap should be your best. I think everything is
starting to come together, we’re showed some pace in the first couple of
weekends although
Sepang was just a hard weekend as we had a lot of teething
problems and problems with my
race seat, but now I’m comfortable in the
car everything goes forward from there. Now I can
concentrate on driving the
car and it’s making all the difference. I feel the issues from Sepang we
can put right and be at the front all weekend. We’re targeting a strong performance for
tomorrow
afternoon and hopefully we can be back at the front and stay there.”
Dan Walmsley, Race Engineer: “I’m really happy with sessions today. The car has
been good
since the very first lap and we’ve spent most the rest of the sessions
working on race set-up. It’s
all very positive, Adam’s happy and we’ve resolved a lot
of issues we had with the seat in the car.
Overall it’s a really great performance
by everyone in the team and now we’ve just got to carry it
through to qualifying.”
Mark Gallagher, Team Principal: “It’s great to see Ireland topping the time sheets,
and by some
margin. Adam showed well in the rookie test session this morning and
the team knew which way
to go with the set-up so when it all came together in
practice it matched our expectations. I would prefer to be P1 on Sunday, but Friday is
a good start.”
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