Schumacher not worried about practice performance

Michael Schumacher refused to read much into Ferrari’s pace in practice for the Hungarian Grand Prix, despite a dominant display from team-mate Felipe Massa at the Hungaroring.

Massa was a huge 1.319 seconds faster than Schumacher’s world championship rival Fernando Alonso in second practice yesterday.

But Schumacher, who trails the Renault driver by just 11 points in the championship, was keen to temper his enthusiasm.

He said: “It is always hard to judge the results on Friday. We need to take a close look at the data to get a clearer picture of the situation.

“I was not able to keep an eye on what the other drivers were doing. Overall we can say that our package is good but we don’t know how competitive the others are.

“Naturally we hope to be at the front of the grid and I think we have a good chance of doing that.”

While Schumacher claimed the unusually chilly Budapest weather was “not a problem” for his Bridgestone tyres, Jenson Button struggled on Michelins.

The Hungaroring traditionally hosts one of the hottest races of the year but scattered showers and cold track temperatures caught teams by surprise.

Honda driver Button was 14th in afternoon practice yesterday and admitted the weather had not helped his cause.

He said: “It’s been a frustrating day for us and the main problem is with the tyres. It’s the same for everyone really in these conditions and it is causing some big issues.

“We really don’t know what is going to happen with the weather on Saturday and Sunday. We just have to hope we have the right tyres.”

Honda sporting director Gil de Ferran added: “We certainly expected for the weather to be much warmer this weekend.

“The unusually cool conditions are dominating the behaviour of our tyres, which in turn is having a great influence on the car balance.”

Another British driver to suffer a disappointing day was David Coulthard, although he insisted Red Bull team need not worry about his 24th place.

Friday practice sees teams fine-tuning their cars for the weekend ahead and Coulthard claims his lack of speed was down to that rather than a genuine problem.

He said: “We are not looking that good but it’s just that we are working to our own programme which is obviously different to others.

“Everything was pretty much the same as during a normal Friday practice, the only difference this week is that we are in Budapest.”