|
“The US Grand Prix marked the
end of the North American double-header and unfortunately it finished in
disappointment, with Mark being taken out on turn one and me finishing one
place off the points. Everyone in the team is looking ahead to France now
and hoping that with a new aero package we’ll see some progress on the
track.
 Indianapolis
was all action for me from the start. Having qualified in 19th I missed a
red light in the pit lane, which was calling me in for a weight check. As a
result, I got bumped down to last on the grid. I’ve got to admit it was
entirely my fault, but the Brickyard is one of the trickiest circuits in the
world to pit at and that’s what distracted me.
Qualifying is the only opportunity we get to practice pitlane entry with the
speed limiter set to race conditions, so I was concentrating on getting that
just right. You arrive for the pits flat out, in seventh, on the exit of a
blind corner so it’s very hard to get the braking right. As I came in I was
thinking about all that and looked down at my steering wheel to check the
speed as I crossed the line. In that second I missed the red light.
As it happened, starting right at the back kept me in the race beyond lap
one. The first couple of corners saw two big pile-ups, which took out eight
cars including Mark. While I was too far away to see who was to blame I did
have one of the best views on the circuit and it looked pretty interesting –
there were cars flying everywhere. I managed to sneak through the carnage
and was up to eighth by the end of lap one, which was fantastic.
I was running okay there, battling with David Coulthard and Antonio Liuzzi
and it looked like I might be able to emulate my performance in the European
GP where I started from the back and finished in the points. It wasn’t to be
though.
When it came to it we just didn’t have the pace to beat the two Red Bulls,
we were lacking a bit of grip round the bends, as well as being short on
straight line speed. Everyone is working so hard at the moment that it’s
quite difficult to understand why we are off the pace. There is no single
area which I can pin point and say we need to improve that, but we’ve got a
new aero package for the high downforce French Grand Prix and I’m hoping
that will make a positive difference.
There are other reasons to be optimistic as the F1 circus returns to Europe:
Magny-Cours is a circuit I’m really familiar with, while Mark and I are
working really well as a team so hopefully these positives will combine in
France and we’ll be back at the sharp end.” |
