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Race Reports
Barcelona 11/05/2007
Barcelona Qualifying
GP2 racing commenced again today in sunny Spain, at the recently remodelled Circuit de Catalunya after a four-week break since the season opener in Bahrain.
Luca Filippi’s qualifying today was unfortunately burdened with engine problems, which occurred in free practice, limiting his time on the track, and only one flying lap, placing him in a fair 10th position.
Team- mate Mike Conway began strong; third quickest of the 26 cars out there. As the 30 minute session drew to an end the British driver’s best time of 1:28.717 qualified him 7th, but due to penalties given to Pantano and Nakajima, both Super Nova drivers move up to 5th and 9th position for Saturdays 4pm race.
iSport will dominate the front row for the sprint race grid tomorrow, with their first ever 1-2 line up, Lucas Di Grassi for ART will start 3rd.
Team Principal David Sears commented “In qualifying today Super Nova looked like both cars would be in the top six, until Luca Filippi’s cars developed a misfire after the ECU was changed, ending up in 10th.
Mike Conway continued to improve his qualifying form and ended up 7th which then became 5th after a couple of drivers had penalties for yellow flags. With both iSport cars are on the front row, it will be an interesting race, but the team believe that we will have a strong race pace.”
Mike Conway said “I’m fairly happy with today’s qualifying. I think we had more time in our 2nd set of tyres, if we’d had time to complete the lap. To start 5th is good, the opportunity is there for a podium & to score points as long as we get a good start and good strategy….It should be good!”
Luca Filippi commented “We found a good balance at end of session which I am happy with. It’s a shame I only had one lap on the second set of tyres before the chequered flag because everyone was quicker on 2nd lap. But we’ve got a good chance of overtaking tomorrow, so I’m looking forward to it.”