Fisichella Aiming for Top Eight in Qualifying

The Jordan team were boosted on Friday by their drivers' performance at the Hungaroring circuit, where the Silverstone-based squad continued to show an improved pace.

Italian Giancarlo Fisichella, who shone at the German Grand Prix last month despite not scoring any points, posted the fifth quickest time with the Honda-powered EJ12, and after his promising start the Roman is confident of qualifying in the top eight tomorrow.

"It's been a good day," said the Italian. "The car looks alright with good balance on used and new tyres. Today on my best lap I had a little graining with the front tyres and I made a mistake in the last three sectors.

"But overall it's looking encouraging and I'm pleased to say I'm confident that we could be on the front three or four rows tomorrow."

Teammate Takuma Sato completed a brilliant day for the Silverstone team, the Japanese rookie setting the sixth fastest time, two tenths of a second behind Fisichella.

"I'm very pleased today as we had no mechanical problems at all and we put in a lot of laps, which is good for me as it's the first time I've been here in Formula One," he said. "It's always good to learn the circuit quickly with the car working well.

"We still have some work in a couple of areas, but even so the car is going really well and our times look good so I'm feeling positive about tomorrow's qualifying."