It was a difficult session for Jos. ...

Published on 20 September 1996 by Verstappen Info Page

It was a difficult session for Jos. It had rained that morning which was the reason that there was hardly any grip on the circuit. Jos therefore decided to stay in during the first session. During his first lap in the second part of the free session Jos had too much understeer and came in again. The second time he came out there appeared to be a problem with the clutch, however, the team fixed this problem very fast so Jos could go out for the third time. Still driving with understeer he managed two timed laps bringing him in 12th position. More front wing was put on (maybe too much) with the result that oversteer made him spin. That was the end of his session. Although Jos and his team were very busy, he could only make a total of 7 laps which compared to the rest of the field who all did 18-29 laps was too less. He ended up in 16th position.

Michael Schumacher was also only in the second session present but was able to clock the fastest time followed by Damon Hill at 0.727 sec. Very surprising was the third place of Ukyo Katayama who made a very fast lap at the end of the second session. The second Ferrari did also a good job. During the first session, Irvine drove the fastest lap, which resulted in the fourth position overall. See Portugal Grand Prix Results for all the times.

The first time this season Ricardo Rosset was faster then Jos (0.223 sec.), however, he drove a total 19 laps against only 7 for Jos.