A1 Team Switzerland was ready for the start of the new A1GP season and the team's season got underway in wet and overcast conditions. Everything worked smoothly as the team qualified fourth for both Sunday's sprint and feature races.
Neel Jani finished 7th in the first free practice and half way through the second session, recorded the fastest lap of the day a on his first outing at Circuit Park Zandvoort round the 2.6 mile circuit with a time of 1m45.090s.
Jani was pleased with the team's morning performance and was looking forward to a challenging qualifying session in the afternoon: "It was a good session, we tried a lot of things and obviously it's my first time running at Zandvoort so I'm still learning the track a bit. The car is not running bad but I think it will be very hard to get it together for this one lap if it's wet in qualifying, so a lot of it will come down to luck today."
In qualifying 1, A1 Team Switzerland's Neel Jani finished in fourth to start from the second row for the sprint race (with a time of 1m46.728s) 1.297s behind the leader, Loic Duval (France). In qualifying 2, A1 Team Switzerland qualified fourth with a fastest time of 1m45.599s, 1.620s behind leader Adrian Zaugg to also start the feature race from the second row of the grid.
Neel Jani commented: "The day started well. Considering the weather conditions, I am happy with our position. For qualifying we were hoping with my engineer and the team that I could keep the morning pace. But in the first qualifying, we could not find a solution to warm the tyres quickly enough and we were struggling massively in the cold weather with tyre temperature. During the second qualifying session, the track was drying out and we lost part of our gamble. The rain did not start as early as we expected and we left just a bit too soon. Anyway, it is good to start the season from row two. The strategy during the race will be key to our success."
Team Principal Max Welti added: "A good result for the very first race of the season and our first weekend. These two results for the two different qualifying sessions are very encouraging. Despite the cold and humid conditions Neel Jani, James Robinson and the new team around them did a fantastic job. I am proud of our results today as this result shows the consistency of the teamwork. We may add a bit of luck if tomorrow is dryer."
A1 Team Switzerland signed a partnership with "Aqua SP" - Aqua SP, Developed by Multi Pro Natural Ltd., is an innovative, non-toxic and Environmentally friendly enzyme based product which acts as a catalyst to the natural oxidization process and speeds up the natural destruction process of bacteria in water without placing undue demand on oxygen contained. This product has a wide range of potential applications; it kills bacteria, viruses, fungi, nematodes and protozoa without the use of any toxins.
Currently the product is in the release process and being prepared for market entry. Aqua SP will be distributed internationally by Multi Pro Natural Ltd., which develops and distributes environmentally friendly products for different sectors.
A1 Team Switzerland is the Swiss national team in motorsport, representing its country in the unique global A1 GP World Cup of motorsport. A1 Team Switzerland is entering its third year of racing in the A1 GP series. After 11 events and 22 races around the world, A1 Team Switzerland finished the inaugural A1GP season as runners-up, winning from pole position in Dubai. In 2006-2007 they again won from the pole in Malaysia, on the way to securing another top eight championship finish.
The drivers racing for their country in 2007-2008 will be Neel Jani and Sébastien Buemi. The rookie drivers will be Marcel Fässler, Tom Dillmann and two lady rookie drivers, Rahel Frey and Natacha Gachnang who participated successfully to a shootout event at Silverstone in September 2007. They will have the chance to represent their national team starting with the Brno Grand Prix, 2nd leg of the A1 GP Championship.
A1 Team Switzerland's selected best results
Sprint race:2 x 1st - Malaysia 2006/2007 (Neel Jani) and Dubai 2005/2006 (Neel Jani)
Feature race:3 x 2nd 2005/2006 South Africa (Neel Jani), Malaysia (Neel Jani), Portugal (Neel Jani)
Pole Position:Malaysia 2005/2006 and 2006/2007 (Neel Jani), Dubai 2005/2006 (Neel Jani)
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- Agnes Carlier - photos A1GP
