German GP: Saturday team comment

By MF1 media
July 30 2006

MF1 Racing continued to struggle at the Hockenheimring on Saturday, with both cars failing to match the promising pace they had demonstrated in recent races.

The team's string of Q2 performances finally came to an end, with Christijan Albers managing only the 18th-fastest time of the first session and teammate Tiago Monteiro taking 20th position.

Tiago Monteiro (POR), #18
Chassis: M16-03
Third Timed Practice Session: 18th, 1:17.793 (+2.165), 23 laps completed
Qualifying: 20th, 1:17.836 (+3.766 from Pole Position lap), 6 laps completed
Quote: "This was the second time in as many qualifying sessions that Mr. Coulthard, who's been around long enough to know better, blocked me on my flying lap. He did it to me in qualifying at Magny-Cours, he did it to Christijan in practice yesterday and he did it to me again today. It's unbelievable, because he's the first one to moan about it in the driver briefings when he thinks someone's done it to him, and yet he thinks he can do it to everyone else. Obviously, this time we're going to complain to the stewards about it, because it's just too much. It's a shame, because I think I could have had a decent run, based on the speed I had on my first aborted lap, when Speed shunted. But unfortunately, we couldn't do it because of Mr. Coulthard. Looking ahead, I still think we'll be OK in the race because we've made the right tyre choice. So with a good strategy and some luck, we might be able to salvage something this weekend."

 

Christijan Albers (NED), #19
Chassis: M16-02
Third Timed Practice Session: 21st, 1:19.254 (+3.626), 15 laps completed
Qualifying: 18th, 1:17.093 (+3.023 from Pole Position lap), 5 laps completed
Quote: "We are pushing to turn around what has been a terrible weekend for us so far. We had bad luck on Friday morning with our engine problem. Then, of course, the rain in the afternoon limited us to a few laps and basically wasted the second session for everyone. This morning, we had electronic problems, so it's been one thing after another. But looking at the positive side, I can see this qualifying effort as a victory, because I think I did a pretty good time on the set of tyres I had, compared to my teammate and the strategy he was running. In that sense, I think my engineers and mechanics did a good job. Now, we'll do our best to run a smart, consistent race tomorrow and see what happens." Colin Kolles, Managing Director: "It's been a difficult weekend for us from the very beginning. Unfortunately, we just haven't been as competitive at this track as we have been at other circuits. We are struggling to get the temperature into the tyres, so we will have to look into the cause of this problem. But the fact remains that Tiago couldn't putt his qualifying lap together because Coulthard blocked him, and that likely cost him a grid position. We will see what the stewards have to say about this."

James Key, Technical Director: "Unfortunately, we didn't get through to the second qualifying session, as we had at the last two races. It's disappointing, but then the entire weekend hasn't really gone our way so far. The red flag during the first session compromised everyone, but it certainly affected our drivers, because they were only able to get in one flying lap each. Tiago had traffic on his, which meant he didn't get the times in the second and third sectors that he wanted. Christijan just put a time in to see where we were, really, because obviously with the engine change, he's going to be at the back of the grid, anyway. He did fine, considering how we were running him. I think it's going to be an interesting race tomorrow."

Johnny Herbert, Sporting Relations Manager: "Not our best performance, obviously. But we've got a good tyre for the race, which is important for us in terms of running consistently and enabling us to finish the weekend with a more positive outlook for Hungary."

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