Ferrari pace on old tyres 'scares' Symonds

Although Fernando Alonso and Giancarlo Fisichella locked out the front row of the grid, Symonds has hinted that Ferrari may have the edge when it comes to long-run pace, judging by their form from Saturday morning's free practice session.

"My main concern really is the times Michael did on Saturday morning with old tyres, just before he changed to new tyres," he said. "It makes it look like their tyre degradation is going to cause us real problems to do anything with today."

Schumacher's run of laps on old tyres in Saturday morning's session peaked with a 1:16.575 seconds, after several laps in the low 1:17. In contrast, Alonso's best lap on old tyres was 1:17.434, while Fisichella managed a 1:17.379.

Symonds said that he had paid extra close attention to Schumacher's pace on old tyres after the team were beaten by the seven-time champion at Imola when he upped his pace on his in-lap at the second stop.

Speaking about the lessons of that race, Symonds said: "Particularly after Imola, we ran so many different simulations about what we could have done better, and it just kept giving us the same result.

"I am not saying that we could have done better, but you still learn a little about the approach and what to look for. And here we were looking very, very carefully at what their (Ferrari's) time was on old tyres, and it scared me when I saw it."

The one factor that should help Renault's chances in the race, however, is that Fisichella is right up there with Alonso at the front of the field, so the Italian could act as a buffer against Schumacher.

In terms of making strategy decisions, Symonds said there would be a higher workload dealing with two cars at the front of the field in the fight against Ferrari - but said it was actually easier than if the cars were at different ends of the grid.

"It is easy when you have two cars with similar performance, a similar place on the grid, and are similar in every respect," he explained.

"It is quite hard to manage two cars when they are spread through the field. You cannot put the two together into working a good strategy using both.

"It is quite complex when you are trying to use both cars, but you can take an advantage when you have got both cars."