Brawn: Tyre temp signs are positive

Ross Brawn refused to press the panic button after Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello could do no better than 17th and 18th in the dry second practice session at Spa, saying the team had made a positive step towards curing the tyre temperature problems that have been hampering it in cool conditions.


Track temperatures rose as high as 34C under the afternoon sun – significantly lower than last week’s race in Valencia, which saw a return to form for Brawn, but considerably higher than at Silverstone in June, which is where the rot set in.


Brawn said the cars’ lack of pace was attributable more to not finding the right set-up yet rather than the familiar tyre temperature bugbear.


“We're not experiencing any issues so far,” said Brawn, “and it's good to see our hard work in this area starting to pay dividends.



“There is still some way to go to maximise the set-up of the car to the requirements of both drivers, so it will be a busy hour of practice tomorrow morning to get ready for qualifying.”


Both Button and Barrichello complained of a lack of rear grip, the latter spinning at Les Combes and later going straight on at the same corner.


However, given that the BGP 001s were the fastest cars through the speed trap, and that Button at various times posted the quickest time through the high-speed first and third sectors, they appeared to be experimenting with running less downforce than their rivals.


Though understandably less upbeat than their boss, both drivers felt their lowly positions were unrepresentative of the speed within their cars.


“The second session this afternoon was much more useful [than the wet morning session],” said Button.


“We worked through a few aero and downforce comparisons as well as looking at the tyres.


“We collected a lot of information, but obviously at the moment we're not as quick as we would like to be.


“There are a few areas that we need to improve on with the balance, but the potential is there to do that ahead of qualifying.”


Button pipped his team-mate by five-thousandths of a second, and both men were within nine-tenths of Lewis Hamilton’s session-topping time.


“The lap times don't tell the whole story,” said Barrichello.


“The car doesn't feel as competitive as it did in Valencia last weekend but we're going to be in a good position to fight hard in qualifying tomorrow.”