07/07/2007
NEWS STORY
Andi Zuber (iSport International) Winner - Two points for pole position, one point for fastest lap, and then points for the race win: it's just perfect for me. The team did a great job, like always, and the race was quite tough because Mike was quite tough and he pushed me a lot, especially after the pitstop. I'm very happy!
Mike Conway (Super Nova International) 2nd - We expected this weekend to be good, we felt confident knowing we had a good car, balance and pace, so we decided not to change too much from Magny Cours. There was a lot of challenging going on with Zuber, so for me it was a really good race - I didn't want it to end! We have a good chance to get another podium tomorrow. A big thank you to the team, as always.
Kazuki Nakajima (DAMS) 3rd - I've had a lot of bad luck earlier in the season: I think we were in a similar position to these guys! So, for me, this is really the start of the season.
Luca Filippi (Super Nova International) 5th - First of all a brilliant team result for us today. We are becoming stronger and stronger, so I'm looking forward to the next race. I had some under steering so I was unable to catch the guys in front, but it's good to be in 5th, and we have every chance to score points tomorrow. The incredible pit stop helped us a lot today for sure. I think we need to improve the car for tomorrow in order to win & that's what I want to do!
Adam Carroll (FMS International) 6th - Today was good but obviously a bit frustrating because we were on the podium until I got a drive through penalty! I kind of knew it was coming though. When I put my foot down to accelerate back up to the pit lane limiter, it didn't stop, so I knew I'd gone over the limit, I just didn't know by how much. The overall performance today just shows the improvement we've made. We've all come together and gelled well as a team, and we have faith in each other - that shows in the way that we've improved the car and situation. I'm still not one hundred per cent in the car, because it's taking me these laps to get up to speed with the race fitness to be able to fight absolutely all the time. The car balance was really good and I was able to be consistent with the lap times, so I'm sure that once we're there we're going to be very, very strong. It's good to be up there again, fighting for podiums, it feels good.
Pastor Maldonado (Trident Racing) 7th - When you start in 19th place and end up into the points it's not bad. Especially if, thanks to that result, you have a concrete chance to drive a great race the next day. The car was definitely better than in qualifying and, as I noticed, our rhythm is good also at the end of the race, on old tires. I had a great time today and I hope to end up even better tomorrow.
Bruno Senna (Arden International) 11th - I had a pretty poor start to be honest. There was a lot of wheelspin and no traction and it was very dirty down there. But throughout the first lap people were just following each other so I just went around the outside of everybody! It was quite straightforward, and not too risky, but unfortunately I think maybe it wasn't the best strategy to pit so early, because the cars in front were not so slow anymore. When I put the second set of tyres the car wasn't working very well, so I wasn't as fast as I needed to be to push. I eventually got up to eleventh and I had fun out there but it's a shame not to get any points. Tomorrow is a long race and I would like to go and get points, it's just a shame I didn't finish in the top eight today.
Javier Villa (Racing Engineering) 13th - We had quite a lot of understeer right from the start and that limited us because on this track, with 99% fast corners, if your car understeers it is quite tough to closely follow other cars as you lose a lot. Despite this I wasn't that slow and I finished caching up the five cars in front of me so we are trying to fix the problem for tomorrow and then I think I can do better.
Filipe Albuquerque (Racing Engineering) 15th - The race has been really useful in gathering experience with the car and especially, with the tyres. You really feel the bigger power of the GP2 car on the rear tyres and I have to get used to the way they wear. Tomorrow I will go better for sure as I'm starting 15th and I'll be using all the experience I have gained today.
Kohei Hirate (Trident Racing) 18th - In the first half of the race everything was fine, the car had a good balance and no problems shown up. Later I started to experience an annoying understeer that made car's control more difficult. I believe it was due to the progressive wear of the front tires.
Jason Tahinci (FMS International) 19th - The race wasn't too bad. I struggled a little bit with traffic on the first few laps and I should have taken advantage that people in front of me were struggling a bit, because I was certainly much quicker than the guys in front over the first few laps. I made a few mistakes that made me lose time a bit but from then on I was just keeping the pace and keeping up with the guys in front. I struggled with the cold rear tyres on the way out of the
pitstop, I lost a lot of time on the first lap after the stop. Other than that the car wasn't too bad and I was reasonably happy with the balance. It's another finish as well and that's good to get the morale and momentum up in the team after the poor start to the season. I'm confident for tomorrow. It's not an easy circuit to pass on, but we'll see for tomorrow.
Christian Bakkerud (DPR) DNF - I made a fantastic start, taking four guys at the first corner, but when I got to the back straight I could feel my clutch going and pitted but we just couldn't do anything. Coming into this weekend I felt really confident and thought we could have had a good result here. One of the guys I passed went on to finish seventh and with the reversed grid rule in GP2 he'll start on the front row tomorrow, so who knows what could have happened. Meanwhile I'll be starting on the last row of the grid with my team mate. It's a bit hard to take in at the moment but I'm sure we'll be back on form again.
Andy Soucek (DPR) DNF - Today, was just not my day. I just went to my starting position after the warm up lap, pressed the clutch and the car stalled, because the clutch had overheated. I then had to start from the pit lane and the guys tried to solve the problem, at least getting it into first gear, although the temperature was still high. I got away but then I had an engine problem and my day was finished.
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