JUNE 6, 2001

Burti will slowly improve with Prost - Rahal

JAGUAR boss Bobby Rahal is expecting his former driver Luciano Burti to improve with the Prost team in the future.

But Rahal admitted his reason for releasing Burti was the Brazilian driver's slow progress after graduating to the race team this year.

"Luciano's doing a good job with Prost and there's an opportunity for the future," said Rahal. "It was the right thing for him and the right thing for us.

"I think with Luciano, the best way I can put it is that his time schedule wasn't our time schedule.

"We couldn't afford to be patient. I think he was doing a very good job but when you're testing you need experience and you need people who know what they need to have in a car."

In De la Rosa, Rahal saw an experienced driver who could give a much better input to the team and his decision appears to have been a good one.