Australia
Team Australia delivered a fast car to John Martin today who met the traffic head on during Qualifying 3 and Qualifying 4.
During his flying lap in Qualifying 1 John Martin missed a gear and lost three tenths of a second with his best time in Qualifying 2 leaving him in 12th position for tomorrow's Sprint Race.
As the team released Martin onto the pit lane for Qualifying 3 the car was quick on new rubber when he came into Clearways and was held up by Team Mexico.
So all was up for Qualifying 4 with eight minutes remaining, John left the team pit and completed his warm up lap passing the pit straight and met Team Pakistan who was on his warm up lap. Adam Khan moved across his front of Martin's car and that was the end of anything positive. Final qualifying for the Feature Race was 19th place.
Alan Jones A1 Team Australia Seatholder: "We finally delivered John the best car so far and lost everything with two moves from Team Mexico and Team Pakistan during Q3 and Q4. He made a slight mistake early in Q1 and Q2. Anything can happen here so we'll wait to see how the team finish the last race of the season"
John Martin: "I was really happy with the car, everything was positive. A slight missed gear was a problem and it cost me that top six place for the Sprint Race. When Team Mexico and Team Pakistan came out in front of me during Q3 and Q4, I couldn't believe it. That was it, all over for any decent track time"
Rob Arnott: "We were robbed today with the two cars of Team Mexico and Team Pakistan baulking John's two flying laps. He missed a gear, that happens. John is very positive considering the results, and we know that he has a very quick car, let's see what we can do tomorrow for a better finish, as we are quick"
Brazil
A1 Team Brasil will begin tomorrow's Sprint and Feature races at Brands Hatch in 19th and 14th positions respectively after a disappointing day for the team at Brands Hatch in the UK. Xandi Negrao was in action for the team in the final qualifying session of the 2007/08 A1GP World Cup of Motorsport season.
Brasil took part in the final one hour practice session this morning, during which Xandi focused on further set-up work on the car. He completed 31 laps of practice, setting a fastest lap time of 1:16.192, which was 1.2s off the pace of session leaders China.
In qualifying for the sprint race Xandi struggled with grip and, after setting a time in the first segment of 1:16.189 was in provisional 16th. His problems continued in the segment and although he improved on his time with a lap of 1:16.117, he fell to 19th and will therefore begin tomorrow's 20-minute sprint race from the tenth row of the grid.
He fared better in the feature racing qualifying session although was disappointed not to make the top ten. He was provisionally 17th after the first segment with a lap time of 1:16.556 on old tyres and then set a time almost a second quicker in the final segment with a lap of 1:15.671. This was his best lap and he moved up to 14th, but in a very competitive session where the top 14 cars were separated by less than a second, he had to settle for a seventh row starting slot.
Xandi Negrao: "In the sprint race qualifying I didn't warm up the tyres properly and I didn't have any grip so I was pushing hard and we didn't get a good lap. In qualifying for the feature race it was much better and I was able to focus on putting together a good lap and hitting the limit of the high speed corners. Unfortunately the times were so close that we are still 14th, but one tenth quicker would have put us easily in the top ten. There is not much I can do as we are starting so far back in the sprint race but I think we're in good shape for the feature race."
Canada
Cracking the top-ten and earning points is tomorrow's mission for A1 Team Canada's James Hinchcliffe after the Toronto racer qualified 15th and 13th respectively for the Sprint and Feature races in Round 10 of the 2007-08 A1GP World Cup of Motorsport, the season finale unfolding at the Brands Hatch Grand Prix Circuit in the United Kingdom, Sunday 4th May.
With Canada looking to secure its highest placing in three seasons of A1GP competition, the team currently ninth from 22 nations, Hinchcliffe is keen to accelerate his learning curve as he makes his racing debut at the 2.62-mile Kent track with points scoring finishes the clear objective. Robbie Kerr repeated last season's feat of securing a pole position for his home event, the British A1GP veteran securing the Sprint pole while India's Narain Karthikeyan trumped the crowd favorite by just over two tenths of a second to snatch the Feature pole.
"Qualifying was interesting, it certainly didn't go quite as we had planned," said Hinchcliffe. "The first segment of the Sprint session was actually my first run on new tires since October. The gain in grip was phenomenal and to be honest I wasn't quite prepared for it. We were a bit off on that run but the second lap time was quite reasonable and would have been a great first attempt so I felt like I was a session behind for the Sprint which is unfortunate.
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