Massa pleased to be back
After missing the last race at Indianapolis, Felipe Massa was back in action for Sauber at Suzuka and was quicker than team-mate Nick Heidfeld
The Brazilian has yet to secure a ride for next season, but was happy to just concentrate on the job in hand. For a part of the second session he held a top 10 position, but dropped back to 15th in the final shake up.
"I'm very pleased to be back at a grand prix, and I'm quite happy with today's performance," he said. "The car had a good balance, but I lost some time with a spark plug problem. Once that was fixed I ran into traffic towards the end of the afternoon session and I also made some mistakes, so I know I can go a lot quicker."
Heidfeld suffered with brake balance problems on his C21 and was three tenths, but only one place, behind Massa.
"Suzuka is my favourite circuit, but as you can see from the positions I'm not very happy with today," he said. "I was struggling to find a decent balance all the time. On old tyres I had oversteer, whereas new ones gave me understeer."
Be part of the Autosport community
Join the conversationShare Or Save This Story
What we have learned about Massa's £64m F1 court action
FIA should have cancelled Singapore 2008 F1 result, says Todt
Prost-like Massa deserved to retire an F1 world champion
Long Beach IMSA: Derani takes pole for Cadillac by 0.009s, then wrecks
IndyCar Long Beach: O’Ward leads Power in opening practice
Latvala: Neuville, Evans tied for WRC Croatia lead "something special"
WEC Imola: Ferrari remains on top in FP2 as Fuoco beats Porsche
The short-term pain that hides a very real Williams improvement
How a Shanghai to Sheffield journey paved the way for China’s F1 hero
Why F1 2026 worst case fears could be key to new rules success
How the F1 driver market situation sits for each team with 2025 openings
Subscribe and access Autosport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
Top Comments