Team Ireland’s Adam Carroll endured a character building start to his A1GP World Cup of Motorsport weekend in Park Algarve, his Ferrari powered A1GP car struggling in windy conditions as the result of a brake issue which saw the highly rated championship contender set the 14th fastest time in practice.

On the magnificent Park Algarve circuit, which features 16 corners over an undulating 4.67km track, the Team Ireland driver found the car’s braking points difficult to predict, noting that the car was not responding as it should and delaying his efforts to get up to speed on his first visit to this venue. Earlier in the day Team Ireland’s rookie driver Niall Quinn was 6th fastest, the rookie session delayed significantly when Team Brazil suffered a high speed accident.

Adam Carroll, 14th, Official Practice 2, 1m33.732s; “It was difficult this afternoon – the car was struggling under braking so I could not really find a definite braking point and that really affects your confidence going into corners. The track is tricky, not easy to drive in places with bumps and blind crests, so you need the confidence to attack it. The head wind was blowing at 45kph down the pit straight made for difficult conditions as well. We’ll look at everything tonight and hopefully get these issues sorted out for tomorrow.”

Niall Quinn, 6th, Official Practice 1, 1m37.561s; “The session was fine – the track was very green to start with, so there wasn’t much grip, but it’s very good to drive and there are several impressive sections including the last sequence of corners. Overtaking is going to be more difficult than I expected.”

Tomorrow morning’s practice session will be followed by qualifying for Sunday’s Sprint Race and Feature Race, with Team Ireland involved in a tight battle for the championship lead with Switzerland and local favourites Team Portugal.