FIA INTERNATIONAL FORMULA 3000
ROUND 5 QUALIFYING AT MONACO

24th May 2002

Round five of this year's championship takes place on the street circuit of Monaco.  Sebastien Bourdais who finished fourth at this race last year, had an excellent second session during qualifying today to take his fourth pole out of five races.  After the first session, Sebastien was only lying in eighth position, but the team made some improvements to the car during the one hour break and when the second session began, Sebastien had got up to top spot within fifteen minutes.  He continued to improve his time and hold onto pole for the remainder of the session, finishing ahead of Rodrigo Sperafico and Patrick Friesacher.  Tiago Monteiro had yet another new circuit to learn during the first qualifying session today and managed to keep away from any incidents on the circuit.  During the second session he felt much more confident and improved his time considerably getting up to eleventh quickest with fifteen minutes left but unfortunately with numerous yellow flags at the end of the session Tiago didn't manage to go any quicker and had dropped to fifteenth by the end of the session.

Sebastien Bourdais 1:28.258 (P1)

"We had two completely opposite sessions today, one was a little disappointing and the second one was perfect.  As soon as we restarted after the first session the car was really, really efficient and I knew it was possible to make the pole and we did so really perfectly.  The most important thing is that we had the best lap three or four times.  The car is consistent, I hope everything will go ok tomorrow."

Tiago Monteiro 1:29.462 (P15)

"I am quite pleased, I think we did a good job and I didn't crash.  We made quite a lot of improvements to the car for the second session.  I didn't feel confident in the first session, I just used to the time to get an idea of it all, I was so surprised by some corners, some were much slower than I thought and some were much faster.  In the second session on my first set of new tyres I didn't get a single clear lap but on my second set when I got a clear lap my time improved by 1.6 seconds and I was expecting two or three more clear laps like that, but the last ten minutes were very frustrating as there were so many yellow flags.  It was my first experience of Monaco and I really love the track, the team did a great job for the second session, we changed a lot of things which really worked out.  For tomorrow the most important thing to do is to stay on the track."

Team Manager - David Sears

"Another fantastic pole position for Sebastien Bourdais, his fourth of the season.  Perhaps he is determined to beat Montoya's record of seven poles in a season.  On a circuit where overtaking is near enough impossible safely, Sebastien is looking good for tomorrow's race and with two of his championship rivals languishing in seventh and thirteenth, it may be possible to gain the championship lead after tomorrow's race.

Tiago Monteiro had quite a good qualifying session to end up fifteenth on his first visit to Monaco, but unfortunately damaging his monocoque for the second race in succession, his team of mechanics are facing an all night job to build another car."
FIA International Formula 3000 2002
Race 5: Monaco
Combined Qualifying Session

Pos.
Driver
Nation.
Team
Session1
Session2

1

S. Bourdais
FRA
Super Nova Racing
1:29.489
1:28.258
2

Rodrigo Sperafico
BRA
Durango Formula
1:29.461
1:28.534
3

P. Friesacher
AUT
Red Bull Junior Team
1:28.553
1:29.319
4

E. Toccacelo
ITA
Coloni F3000
1:28.596
1:28.628
5

D. Saelens
BEL
European Minardi F3000
1:29.136
1:28.706
6

B. Wirdheim
SWE
Arden International
1:30.090
1:28.826
7

T. Enge
CZE
Arden International
1:28.885
1:28.941
8

Ricardo Sperafico
BRA
Petrobras Junior Team
1:29.236
1:28.959
9

M. Haberfeld
BRA
Team Astromega
1:29.303
1:28.959
10

A. Pizzonia
BRA
Petrobras Junior Team
1:29.095
1:29.796
11

R. Nguyen
AUS
Team Astromega
1:30.914
1:29.107
12

R. Mauricio
BRA
Red Bull Junior Team
1:30.244
1:29.120
13

G. Pantano
ITA
Coloni F3000
1:29.896
1:29.195
14

R. Briscoe
AUS
Coca-Cola Nordic Racing
1:31.511
1:29.360
15

T. Monteiro
POR
Super Nova Racing
1:31.066
1:29.462
16

A. Muller
GER
Durango Formula
1:29.897
1:29.532
17

N. Kiesa
DEN
PSM Racing Line
1:31.603
1:30.450
18

Z. Baumgartner
HUN
Coca-Cola Nordic Racing
1:31.855
1:31.963
19

A. Sperafico
BRA
European Minardi F3000
1:32.043
1:31.875
20

T. Schmidt
GER
PSM Racing Line
1:32.284
1:32.498