Sunday March 31st, 2002

Ulsterman Eddie Irvine was happier with the pace of his Jaguar team's R3 car despite a point-less race in Brazil on Sunday.

Both Irvine and teammate Pedro de la Rosa have been unhappy with the Milton Keynes squad's new R3 since the start of the season, and the team even considered reverting to last year's R2.

But Irvine was encouraged by the performance of the new car at the Brazilian Grand Prix after finishing just outside the points in seventh place.

"Keeping out of trouble was the main objective and as we said before this race, bringing a car home at Interlagos usually ends up with a reward of some kind," said Irvine, who gave Jaguar their first points of the season by finishing fourth in Australia.

"We were a little unlucky not to have made it into the points today, but I am very pleased with the way this weekend has gone. We have learned a great deal about the R3 and there is still plenty of development left in the package."

Spaniard de la Rosa, who had outqualified his teammate on Saturday but finished right behind Irvine in today's race, was happy with the team's decision to continue using the R3, and was also confident for the future.

"The team's decision to stick with the R3 was spot-on and we will now apply the results of this weekend to our Valencia test next week," he said. "Given that we started the season from the back of the grid in Melbourne, the rate at which we are improving clearly demonstrates the fact that we are on the right path."

Published at 22:11:40 GMT