23/11/2012
NEWS STORY
The final Grand Prix weekend of the 2012 season got underway at the Interlagos circuit in Sao Paulo today. Michael and Nico completed 72 and 76 laps respectively of the 4.309 km circuit. The team spent the morning session evaluating the 2013 development tyres provided by Pirelli. This afternoon saw the usual race preparation work with the medium and hard tyres for this weekend.
Michael Schumacher: It was a reasonably good day, and we kept working on our planned programme. However, the predictions for Sunday at the moment are for rain, so there may be totally different conditions then. We therefore have to see what we can make of today's data and transform it into a good qualifying and, even better, a good race.
Nico Rosberg: It was a decent Friday for us today. There were difficult conditions out there because of the high track temperatures and the altitude which made it hard to find grip. However we managed quite well and, especially on the long runs, the pace was good. So I hope we can do better here than in the previous races. But it will be tough for us, and our focus is still on learning and understanding for 2013.
Ross Brawn: We had a pretty good final Friday of the season today. We had the 2013 development tyres from Pirelli to work with and spent this morning going through a series of evaluations. It was a good session and we collected a lot of interesting data. This afternoon, we focused on race preparation and high fuel work. The car seems fairly well balanced and the tyres for this weekend proved consistent despite the high track temperatures. There is speculation that Sunday will be very wet so it may prove futile, but we've completed a large part of our preparation if it remains dry.
Norbert Haug: A smooth and decent first day for us at this last Grand Prix of the 2012 season. During the first session, we had our first experience with the Pirelli tyres for the 2013 season. In the second session this afternoon, our lap times looked quite consistent during our race simulations. The weather forecast predicts rain for Sunday and slightly cooler temperatures tomorrow than we experienced today when track temperatures reached about 50 degrees. If the forecast is right, everybody will have to handle different conditions than experienced today.
Check out our Friday gallery, here.