Pizzonia Laments 'Frightening' Conditions

Jaguar driver Antonio Pizzonia admitted he had a frightening time completing his flying lap in a very wet Circuit Gilles Villeneuve during today's first qualifying for the Canadian Grand Prix.

"That was quite frightening to be honest," admitted the Brazilian rookie, who finished as 17th quickest. "Just keeping the car in a straight line was a challenge because of its tendency to aquaplane in a straight line.

"The aim of sessions like this is to bring the car home and not get over ambitious. We saw several drivers suffer and spin off today and my goal was to nurse the car home."

Pizzonia, who is yet to score his first F1 points, put Jaguar on top of the timesheets in free practice after being fined $5,750 for speeding in the pitlane. However, he was unable to repeat the feat in the afternoon.

"It is a little disappointing given the good work we achieved this morning and had it been a dry qualifying session, we could have reaped some reward from our testing and free practice work," he said.

"The team is well prepared for the weekend ahead and assuming it's dry tomorrow, we should be able to go out there and realise our full potential around this race track."

Jaguar teammate Mark Webber also admitted the track conditions were very tricky, although the Australian could cope better with them and finished in ninth position.

"I'm pleased with what we achieved out there given the terrible conditions," said the Australian. "It's extremely tough for any driver just to go out there and manage a quick time. The track has no grip anywhere and aquaplaning was a big problem.

"Our two-hour test session, however, proved very valuable today and while the rain has spoiled qualifying for everyone, our preparation work from this morning should hold us in good shape for the weekend ahead â€" providing we have some dry conditions to take advantage of."