De la Rosa Refuses to Get Carried Away

Jaguar driver Pedro de la Rosa is expecting to go back to his usual position in Saturday's qualifying despite a promising start to his Japanese Grand Prix on Friday.

De la Rosa finished today's practice session in third place with the Michelin-shod Jaguar, but the Spanish driver said he wasn't expecting to be able to keep his position in tomorrow's qualifying.

"We know where we are, and we'll probably be in the same positions where we are normally," said de la Rosa, who finished more than seventh tenths of a second behind Jean Alesi, who was quickest.

"Some other Fridays we've done the same procedure, and we've been much lower on the grid, so we'll see tomorrow. I hope that we find a little bit more grip from the car, otherwise we have to run a bit too much downforce, and we'll be slow on the straight."

De la Rosa's teammate Eddie Irvine completed a promising day for the Milton Keynes team by finishing in sixth place.

Team boss Niki Lauda also predicted that the team will not be able to repeat their performance in qualifying or in the race and said a midfield grid position is the best they can hope for.

"We achieved everything we set out to do (but) the final classification times are not worth reading into," Lauda said. "We have a well-balanced car that works very well through the slow to medium speed corners.

"The problem, however, is the longer high-speed corners and to be honest, it's the same issue we have been fighting all season."