Autosport Plus

How to become a qualifying master

Extracting the best from a car in qualifying is a key skill for aspiring professionals to learn. James Newbold delves into the guiding principles you need to know to ace a single flying lap

Performance

Our experts' guide on how you can become a better racing driver

The 'Trulli train' is a phrase that Jarno Trulli knows well. It was popular in the early noughties, used to describe the queue of frustrated drivers who would habitually form behind the Italian in the early laps of a grand prix after he had qualified midfield machinery higher than it had any right to stay in race trim.

Yet the passing of time means such things take a lesser significance and Trulli, who scored four pole positions in 256 appearances in Formula 1, has come to adopt the expression as a badge of honour for his exploits in lesser cars.

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Author James Newbold

James Newbold is Autosport's Plus Editor, responsible for coordinating website feature content.

In a sign of things to come, having completed his Politics and International Relations degree at the University of East Anglia in 2015, he left his graduation ceremony early to catch the last train to Brussels for the following day's Spa 24 Hours.

After a period as a freelancer, he joined the Autosport staff in 2018 and won the Motorsport UK young journalist of the year award. He initially edited Autosport magazine's Performance and Engineering supplements before joining the website team in his current role in 2020.

A keen enthusiast of anything that can be categorised unusual or niche, he enjoys unearthing little-known stories across all branches of motorsport, but has spent most of his career covering sportscars and is a regular part of the Le Mans 24 Hours reporting team.

He lives with his wife and children in Plymouth, England.