January 20, 2008	Sunday	Muharram 10, 1429

TAUPO (New Zealand), Jan 19: Home nation A1 Team New Zealand on Saturday qualified in pole position for Sunday morning’s Sprint race at Taupo while France took the Feature race pole.

It was an unusual qualifying hour as the majority of teams waited as late as possible to take to the windy, dusty track during each of the four 15-minute qualifying segments.

A 22nd place start for the Sprint race and 21st place for the Feature race came A1 Team Pakistan’s way in the afternoon qualifying session. A1 Team Pakistan resumed running this morning with high winds kicking up plenty of dust and buffeting the drivers on the Taupo track. The final hour of practice gave the team the chance to fine tune the setup of the A1GP car ahead of the qualifying. An early red flag for the stranded Czech car brought all the cars back to the pits after just four laps of running.

The interlude was used by the team to make a few setup changes to the Pakistan car. The car was moved and Pakistan, along with the other 21 nations returned to the track and Adam continued to gain track experience through the remainder of the hour.

Finishing with 21st fastest lap time, the team then set to work to prepare the car for qualifying. In the first two segments of qualifying Pakistan completed a flying lap in each of the two.

The first of Adam’s quick laps gave him a provisional 13th place, and although he improved his time for the second segment, he dropped back down the order to 22nd and the Pakistan team will take this position for the grid of the Sprint race.

Adam said after qualifying, “I’m a bit disappointed as we didn’t maximise our potential in the session. We struggled with traffic, and the dusty conditions. It’s not an easy track to learn or to master, and the dust blowing across the track made each corner very unpredictable. For tomorrow we need to turn consistent laps and keep out of trouble, then we can be in with a chance of improving on our grid places.”

John Allen, Team Manager, A1 Team Pakistan adds, “It wasn’t as good as we expected today, with the dusty, slippery conditions challenging us. For a driver who is relatively inexperienced with these conditions, added to the traffic that we had and a technically difficult circuit, it is tough. I think we’ll improve our pace and make progress; Adam has already learnt a lot from Danny, our driver coach and as we work together, the results will start to come through.”

The A1GP World Cup of Motorsport New Zealand race weekend concludes on Sunday with the Sprint and Feature races. The action begins in the morning with the short distance of twenty minutes racing. A colorful driver’s parade and opening ceremony will entertain the fans prior to the main Feature race, in the afternoon, which features two mandatory tyre change pitstops. The 22 nations will line up at 11am for the Sprint race and 3pm for the Feature race.—Agencies