Australia : Midland F1 team preview

By Phil Giles
March 31 2006

The third round of the World Championship begins on Friday at Melbourne's Albert Park. You'd have thought by now that the Aussies were a bit fed up of sport but no, it just keeps coming.

Midland arrive in town refreshed after an opening fortnight where quite frankly they disappointed fans who had hoped that earlier promises made about the teams fortune would have shown a marked turn around from 2005. 

The team hope that they have sorted the transmission and launch problems that dogged the drivers at Bahrain and Sepang.  They've made some minor performance enhancements and the team feel that the car will be better suited to the tracks corners and straights.

Tiago Monteiro
“I love this city, and I have very fond memories of this circuit. This was, after all, where I made my F1 debut last year. I tend to like street circuits – this one and Monaco are the only two on the calendar that use public roads – because they’re unforgiving and they give the drivers a chance to make more of a difference. I also think this track suits our car a little better than the previous two. Downforce is still a big factor, but there isn’t as much of an emphasis on straight-line aerodynamic efficiency. We’ve made big gains in that department since last year, but nobody sits still in Formula 1, and we still have some work to do. But if we’ve done our homework and the car is running the way that it should, I’m pretty confident we can have a much better race here.”

Christijan Albers
“Unlike Tiago, my first memories of this track are not so nice! I retired with transmission problems early in the race, so I’d rather forget about that. But I’m really looking forward to this year’s race, and fighting alongside the team to get some more performance out of the car. I really think we’re going to do better here, because our car tends to work better on this type of track. This is a really hard-braking circuit, and our stability under braking keeps improving all the time, so I expect to have some good battles. There should be some good wheel-to-wheel racing, with plenty of overtaking opportunities. Spectators should enjoy this race, and hopefully, we will, too!”

Markus Winkelhock
“This is a similar situation to Bahrain, in that I’ve never been here before, so everything is new. I’ve tried to familiarise myself with the circuit by doing some laps on Playstation and watching a recording of last year’s race, and I think that was quite helpful. I’m also going to do a few laps on foot or by bike, examining all the corners carefully, so hopefully that will speed up the process a bit. I’m going to have to take it easy on my first few laps, though, because unlike Bahrain, there aren’t any wide run-off areas – the walls are quite close to the track, so you can’t afford to make any mistakes. I may not have actually driven here before, but just from looking at it, I have a feeling I’m going to enjoy this track.”

Dominic Harlow
“From a technical point of view, Melbourne represents a different challenge from the previous two races. This is a street circuit that’s put together specifically for this weekend, so it has its own set of demands on the cars and drivers. It tends to start off quite ‘green’ [slippery] and then improve a lot during the weekend. We’ve got quite a few new parts for this event, so we’re hopeful for some improved performance, both from the engine and chassis side of things. The weather here tends to be more unpredictable than at most circuits, so if any rain comes along, we’ll be sure to take advantage of those conditions.”