Renault happy with the race at Nürburgring!

By role
June 29 2003

The Renault F1 team had reasons to smile at the end of the European GP. The team has showed lately than in the tracks they expect to excel, like in Monaco and Nürburgring, they struggle and when they expect to suffer, like in Canada, they excel.

This weekend meant for the team a tremendous amount of work to set the cars competituve for the race.

The team of mechanics that worked so hard to have the car at its best should be happy with the performance and the effort of Alonso and Trulli.

Both of them had to fight a hard race today and even if Trulli had to abandon due to a fuel pressure problem, ALonso was able to finish 4th after fighting hard with Coulthard and Michael Schumacher.

"A good race for me, and a strong result after a difficult weekend. I had a good fight with Jarno in the first few corners, which he eventually won coming out of Turn 4. I managed to get past him when he pitted before me, but I lost some performance during the last stint, even though we made small aerodynamic changes at both stops. I was under a lot of pressure during the last stint, first from Coulthard and then Michael, but I managed to keep my position. Ralf’s win means I have lost my third position in the Championship, but I’m not too worried: we did a good job this weekend." Said the Spaniard.

Trulli was not as lucky and a fuel pressure problem made him abandon while he was running 5th behind his teammate:

"Unfortunately, I think my car stopped with a fuel pressure problem. Until the retirement, I was having a good race: I managed to keep up with the leaders at the start, but then lost time behind Fernando during the second stint: I was a little bit quicker, but could not overtake. It looked like we were going to get two points finishes today, and it is therefore a shame to leave with just one."

The boss, Flavio Briatore was indeed quite happy:

"I am very happy with the result. I’m sorry for Jarno, who was very quick all weekend and did a fantastic job during the race. As for Fernando, he didn’t crack under the pressure and scored some more valuable points."