The weather was very hot for qualifying. The Circuit Gilles Villeneuve was slippery, at least in part due to the fresh repaving, overall before the race, and here and there after Friday's session due to drivers' complaints. The drivers also complained Saturday about the dust as well as the concreted repairs made overnight. Is this the Whine and Cheese set?
American
Red Bull Development Driver, SCOTT SPEED, ran the Friday morning test session in the third Red Bull car. He was fifteenth among the 23 drivers on course, with a time of 1m 18.499s, faster than his two team-mates, DAVID COULTHARD and CHRISTIAN KLIEN. Red Bull has announced that Klien will race in at least the next four Grand's Prix, for consistency and evaluation. Klien and VITANTONIO LIUZZI have been swapping the ride, and Red Bull wants to be fairer in comparing the drivers.
Speed went off course at the end of the morning session and damaged the car, causing him to miss the afternoon session. Speed will also run as the Red Bull Friday Test Driver at the United States Grand Prix in Indianapolis next weekend. Red Bull has a large American market and is using Speed for the two North American
F1 races. Red Bull is also the title sponsor for this years first United States
MotoGP race at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca in mid-July.
After the session, he said: "The car is comfortable to drive and I was out there trying to do the best job I could, to enable the team to get the data they needed. I was concentrating on trying to give the team some good feedback from the laps I completed. It was a shame I went off before the end of the session. Before that, the balance of the car had felt good and the condition of the track was improving with every lap."
