During today's free practice, Jos did very ...
Published on 30 October 1998 by Verstappen Info Page
During today's free practice, Jos did very well. On a dry circuit he drove a nighth time in 1:42.191. During the session, Jos was struggling with oversteer where the team tried out several set-ups. At the end of the second session after new tyres were mounted, it all worked out fine resulting in the ninth time in front of both Benettons and his team mate.
After the free practice, Jos stated as followed: "Of course I am very pleased with the result of today. While we have struggled a lot with understeer this season, today we had lots of difficulties with oversteer. This weekend we are using the new differential which is a great improvement, but also the cause of the oversteer problems. During the first hour we tried several set-ups to improve the car but we were not able to drive below 1:45. In between both sessions we completely changed the car and won almost 3 seconds". Jos had lots of difficulties with his race engineer this season. Therefor the team had decided to assign the Frenchman Sinteff as Jos his race engineer. Jos was pleased with this decision: "Indeed, he worked at the factory as a designer. Although he speaks very rapidly with a strong French accent, his technical skills are very good".
The conditions for Jos today were far from ideal: "I have difficulties again with my ear. Each time I take off my helmet I have huge pains. Last Monday we left to Japan, but I still have difficulties with a jet lag causing not much sleep last night. Despite all these problems I am very pleased with today's result, and we have to go back a long time that I was within the top-10. Therefor it is a nice present for my wife Sophie who is celebrating her birthday today". For tomorrow, Jos is optimistic: "We now have a good set-up to work with. It's not perfect yet, but we now where to improve the car. The car also performs great with the new compound tyres from Bridgestone which also helped with today's result".
His team-mate Barrichello drove with 1:43.854 a seventeenth time. Rubens also had lots difficulties finding a good set up but remains optimistic for tomorrows qualifying.
The battle between Michael Schumacher and Mika Häkkinen, was won by the German today. Although Häkkinen was fastest during the first session, he finished the day at 0.8 sec behind Schumacher who was fastest today. Second was Ralf Schumacher followed by Frentzen, Irvine, Häkkinen and Coulthard.
For a complete overview you can take a look at our season page.
