Toyota Drivers Reserve Judgement on New Car

Toyota driver Cristiano da Matta has said it is impossible to predict how competitive the team's updated car will be when it debuts at the German Grand Prix next week.

The TF104B will race for the first time at Hockenheim after having been tested for four days at the Jerez circuit this week. The team, however, tested only the chassis, while the new aerodynamic package will only debut at the weekend.

"We have high hopes for the updated car, but it's impossible to assess its performance yet," said da Matta, who tested the car for the first time on Tuesday. "The new aerodynamic package is going straight to Hockenheim and we won't be able to test that until the race weekend itself.

"But at least we've given the monocoque a shakedown to get through some of the small problems now. I missed quite a bit of running on both days with electrical glitches, but any time a new car goes onto the track for the first time, we need to see if something unexpected comes up, and find out how to fix it.

"We did some work on suspension and we also put in a tyre test both for Hockenheim and the Hungaroring as there is no testing between the two races."

Frenchman Olivier Panis, who tested the car on Thursday only, also refused to make any predictions on how quick the car would be in Germany.

"I was only here in Jerez on Thursday. But it gave me a chance to try out the monocoque of the TF104B," said Panis. "We will only have the full aerodynamic package available in Hockenheim, so we can't make any predictions yet.

"It was also difficult to maintain the flow of the day here because we had gearbox and electrical problems. Nevertheless, we carried out a tyre test for Hockenheim and we achieved 81 laps, which was a lot considering the problems we were faced with.

"So the guys did a good job to keep the car on the track as much as possible and we ended up completing the programme we set out to do."