Both cars endure to the finish of a tough Oz GP

By nGO
March 18 2007

There was drama at the start as problems with Davidson's car left him last. Then an incident with Sutil sent him flying and in pain, However both drivers finished the race.

It was new teritory for Super Aguri to be so high up on the grid, despite a solid double finish with two reliable cars, one could say it was slightly dissapointing. There is an almost anticlimatic feeling as the dream practice and qualifying turned into a troublesome race. However positives can be taken away, the SA07 is a reliable machine with competitive pace.

Positive start for Sato who finishes 12th "Firstly, well done to everybody in the team. It is a positive start to the season, with two reliable cars finishing the race. I had quite an exciting start and first lap amongst the pack, which I enjoyed. But with the differing track conditions, I was struggling a bit with the balance of the car which meant that we could not make the most of it.

"But I take this as a positive learning experience and something that we shall have to work on from here. During my second stop we lost some time and that affected our finishing position. That was unfortunate, but I think we've shown good performance and made a very solid start, so I am looking forward to having another good race in Malaysia."

Problems at the start and an incident with a Spyker at the start ruined Davidson's race, however he bought the car home in 16th, "The car went into anti-stall at the start, which is such a shame as I didn't go anywhere, so obviously I was then in last place as we went into turn one. I collected myself and thought that maybe I'd get some early positions back.

"I went round the outside of one of the Spyker's and they hit me quite heavily, even though I thought I'd given them enough room. The car got pitched into the air and landed very heavily and I hurt my upper back. The jolt also winded me a lot making talking on the radio difficult.

"I think that we've got to work on our pace for the next race, so we need to do some more long runs and understand what happens to the balance during the test in Sepang.

"My car suffered a lot of damage, the whole right side of the bodywork was gone, the floor's broken, and I must have lost a major amount of downforce and that obviously slows you down a lot. It was a fight, but I got to the end of the race and saw my first Grand Prix chequered flag."