Schumahcer sets the pace at home race
Michael Schumacher set the pace in the first practice session for Sunday's Luxembourg Grand Prix when he put his Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro F300 three tenth's of a second ahead of Mika Hakkinen's McLaren-Mercedes. Using the short wheelbase version of the Ferrari F300 for the Nurburgring circuit, Michael concentrated on tyre evaluation and chassis balance during the morning session with no problems to report. Eddie Irvine carried out similar work with the second chassis taking the fourth fastest time, both Ferraris running the soft option tyres to set their times. For this vital race for the Championship the team again have four cars present - all in the short wheelbase configuration.
No problems for Hakkinen
After a trouble free session Mika Hakkinen took the second fastest time of the session in the dual that is focussed between himself and Michael Schumacher for the title. Team-mate david Coulthard was only fifth fastest, the Scot working on the balance of his chassis through the long corners "where it is very important to have confidence in the car and to know what it is doing," he explained. He added that his car was suffering from high speed oversteer that he was working to eliminate.
Frentzen fastest for Williams
Heinz-Harald Frentzen set the third fastest time of the session for Williams, the German fitting a fresh set of tyres at the end of the session on which he set his quickest lap. Jacques Villeneuve was seventh fastest, the Canadian hampered by an electrical problem which forced the team to disconnect his car's power steering system.
Fisichella well up for Benetton
Giancarlo Fisichella was again the quickest Benetton driver for Benetton with the sixth fastest time after a routine session working on his car's set-up. Alexander Wurz was eighth fastest having an off-course excursion at one point , but with no damage to his car.
In brief...
Both Prost drivers complained of understeer and no traction out of the chicane. Ralf Schumacher broke the steering arms on his Jordan when he spun over the chicane half way through the session. Jos Verstappen was another driver to go off at the chicane. Rosset got stuck out on the circuit when he went off after 15 laps, his team mate experiencing clutch problems when he tried a practice start just before the end of the session. Tuero was learning the circuit with his Minardi running 23 laps , the most of the session.
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