Adam Khan: “We have really struggled to find a good set up for the car”
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Oct 13, 2007
A1 Team Pakistan
A1 Team Pakistan were back in action today at the A1GP Brno, Czech Republic for qualifying at round two of the A1GP World Cup of Motorsport. Despite suffering with handling problems, Adam Khan put in the team? s best qualifying performance since the first ever A1GP race in 2005.
On a drying track, A1 Team Pakistan driver Adam Khan made the most of the final practice session of the weekend. With significant changes made to the car, the team were hopeful of improving their lap times. In a last minute dash before the chequered flag, the team jumped from 22nd to 18th on the timing sheets, tofinish the session just 0.042 seconds behind India.
In a new qualifying system for season three, the team? s best lap time from the first two segments are used toset the grid for the Sprint race and the best lap time from the third and fourth segments set the grid for theFeature race.
Going out in Q1 on old tyres, Khan was still struggling with the balance of the car and was 21 out of 22 cars. With just one flying lap available to improve his position for tomorrow? s Sprint race, Khan went out on new tyres for Q2. The 22 year-old responded to the pressure to improve his time by over six seconds and will start from 13th on the grid for the Sprint? the teams best qualifying position since the first ever A1GP race, at Brands Hatch in 2005.
Reverting to old tyres for Q3, Khan again struggled for grip, and faced another last minute charge in Q4. Pushing hard and suffering from understeer, Khan ran wide on his final qualifying lap and set the 19th fastest time, the position the team will take in tomorrow? s Feature race.
Reflecting on his qualifying performance, Khan said,? I just about managed to get a half decent run together on the new tyres on the second qualifying run. It was a very good lap considering how much slower we are on old tyres, so I? m pleased we? ll be starting the Sprint race from 13th.
? We have really struggled to find a good set up for the car and to find the right balance so far this weekend. We are going to have to work very hard overnight to get a good position in the races tomorrow, simply because I know we will be suffering with a lot of understeer. I think really we are a little bit higher on the grid than what the car is currently capable of during the race, so it could be quite a challenging day tomorrow, but the team and I will do our very best to get a good result for Pakistan.
A1 Team Pakistan team manager Bobby Issazadhe commented,? Our performance in qualifying was a bit confusing. Adam did a great job in Q2 to set the 13th fastest time, but unfortunately we weren? t able to repeat that when qualifying for the Feature race. There are still some set up issues we have to resolve. We will be working very hard between now and the Sprint race tomorrow to see where we are losing the most time and make some changes. Unfortunately we won? t be able to test whether these changes are beneficial until we are in race conditions tomorrow.
A1 Team Pakistan seatholder Arif Husain added,? It? s a good result for the team ahead of the Sprint race.It? s been a bit of a frustrating weekend so far, but I think it? s a reflection of how strong the team is that ourbest qualifying since 2005 has come from such a difficult weekend.?
