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BRAZILIAN GRAND PRIX EXCLUSIVE
HILL SET FOR VICTORY NUMBER 15
By Nicholas Frankl TACH European Bureau
World Championship leader and favourite Damon Hill will start from pole position for tomorrows Brazilian Grand Prix. The British driver set a fastest lap of 1m 18.111 seconds around the twisting 2.637-mile Jose Carlos Pace track. His Renault Williams car, clearly still the fastest and finest combination, out paced both team-mate Jaques Villeneuve and home favourite Rubens Barrichello who dragged every once of performance from his yellow Jordan Peugeot in order to grab a place on the front row in what was the second best qualifying performance in his career.
"Last year I just couldn't get to grips with the fact that all the hopes of Brazil rested with me, but now I relaxed and everything seemed to come good today, I just hope we can better this for tomorrow" commented Barrichello who was besieged in the garage by the assembled F1 media, and who will be making his 50th Grand Prix start come Sunday.
Hill was equally bullish in the press conference.
"The engine is perfectly suitable for providing the horsepower and driveability needed for tomorrow's race," said Hill. "It's a strong car, reliable in every aspect. I'm confident all will go well."
This, however, was not the case with the Benetton camp, who had run away with yesterdays final session and whose driver's found the changing track temperature and humidity not to their, nor their cars, liking. Both Alesi (5th) and Berger (8th) going off in the morning practice and unable to re-establish Fridays blistering performance.
It took all of Schumachers super human efforts to get his Ferrari around in anything resembling a decent time, the double World Champion finally resorting to running his car on the limit, which allowed him to finish in fourth spot and duly run out of Shell on his warm down lap. Irvine, who crashed so spectacularly yesterday, was out in the T car, which spent most of the time in the garage or off the track, the Irishman struggling with understeer. Tenth was all he could have expected, though he'll get his own car back again for the race.
That left Martin "Barrel Roll" Brundle (the man who exited stage left so spectacularly in Melbourne) on a very impressive 6th spot in the second of the Jordans, Hakkinen's McLaren- Mercedes 7th and Berger, Frentzen (Sauber-Ford) and Irvine rounding-up the top ten.
The scene looks set for a classic confrontation. Hill, who needs
every point he can muster before Ferrari get there act together and
start winning races, (it won't be long), and local hero
Barrichello. Age 23, born and bread under the yellow and green flag,
with the responsibility of a Nation who's last patron saint won here
in 1993 and was taken from a people who refuse to accept his death and
yearn desperately for the vacuum to be filed.
It's not a position, nor a man, that many would wish to cross come
the first corner, Sunday 2pm.
