BMW WilliamsF1 Team Reactions San Marino GP

By BMW WilliamsF1 Team
April 24 2005

Reactions ... San Marino GP Race

Both BMW WilliamsF1 Team cars reached the chequered flag at the end of today’s race with both Mark Webber and Nick Heidfeld finishing just out of the points.

Test: Silverstone: 26-28 April – (M. Webber, A. Pizzonia, Nico Rosberg).

Mark Webber

10th Best time: 1:24.419min (lap 17, 14th overall)
Chassis: FW27 05 - BMW P84/5 engine 2nd GP
"From the start, Trulli got past me straight away and so too did Sato, but I was able to recover this position at Tosa. After that I had to sit behind Jarno during the first stint, and it happened that we pitted on the same lap and I could not pass him. So I tried to pass Jarno on the track at the Variante Alta but while having a go, I had a big moment and let Villeneuve through. The last part of the race was difficult as I was struggling because the engine of my car was slowed down, having already run two GPs."

Nick Heidfeld

9th Best time: 1:23.917 (lap 54, 9th overall)
Chassis: FW27 04 / BMW P84/5 engine 1st GP
"I lost a couple of places off the line and we obviously have to improve our starts. After that, Jarno held up the pack where I was for most of the time. I think towards the end of the race my pace was good enough to collect some points, but of course we want to be more competitive than just scoring points, so we must find more speed. I could catch up with Jarno and Ralf very quickly, but overtaking on this circuit was another matter. At the last pit-stop Ralf Schumacher got in front of me by forcing me to brake hard and avoid a crash."

Dr Mario Theissen BMW Motorsports Director

"Congratulations to Michael Schumacher for an extraordinary race, even though Fernando Alonso won in the end. For us, on the other hand, after a reasonable qualifying it was a disappointing race outcome. Both the drivers were held up in traffic for most of the race, but at no time were they in a position to get to the top. We had no technical problems and reliability was there, simply not the speed."

Sam Michael Chief Operations Engineer WilliamsF1

"It is obviously both a disappointing result and day overall. We had a poor start and we spent the whole race in traffic. Clearly we have to improve this for the future. That said, the car’s competitiveness was not as bad as it might have appeared due to the traffic but it’s certainly not where we expected to be. We had no mechanical
problems at all."