BMW Sauber F1 Team - Spanish GP - Race
Spanish Grand Prix – Race,
Weather: sunny and dry, 26-28°C air, 39-42°C track
Barcelona (ESP). Nick Heidfeld finished 8th in the Spanish
Grand Prix and this result means the new BMW Sauber F1 Team
has now collected world championship points from four of the
six races to date. Jacques Villeneuve started at the very
back of the grid in 22nd but managed to work his way up to
12th.
Nick Heidfeld: 8th
BMW Sauber F1.06-02/BMW P86
Fastest Lap: 1:17.869 min on lap 49 (10th fastest overall)
I am very happy. The goals we set for ourselves were to be
in the top ten in qualifying and in the points in the race,
and we achieved both of these. For me it is very important
to be back to normal again. The steps we have taken are working
and obviously we found what the problems were from Imola and
the Nürburgring. My start wasn’t good, but I was
able to defend tenth and the balance of the car was okay for
the entire race distance. It was important to overtake Rubens
Barrichello. At this point in the race his car was heavy and
mine was light. If he had held me off I would not have made
it into the points, but I overtook him on the outside in turn
one, which is always fun.
Jacques Villeneuve:12th
BMW Sauber F1.06-03/BMW P86
Fastest Lap: 1:18.050 min on lap 62 (12th fastest overall)
I had a good start, but the two Super Aguris had amazing starts
and then there were cars in front and there was nowhere to
go. It was a question of braking late. I was next to David
Coulthard, but then he pushed me wide a little bit, which
was fair. Then I lost six seconds in the first two or three
laps, and that was it. We could not do too much today, the
best I think we could have hoped for was tenth without the
start difficulties. Our pace was good in the race, and we
have a lot of mileage left on our engine for Monaco, so we
can do a lot of laps and we should be quick there.
Mario Theissen (BMW Motorsport Director):
As usual in Barcelona it was a race with not a lot of overtaking
and this time with not a lot of incidents either. Our drivers
with their different strategies had problem free and mistake
free races. Nick managed to go from tenth to eighth and collected
one important point. Jacques made up ten positions and came
in 12th with his one stop strategy. During this season we
have collected points in four out of six races and we are
satisfied with this.
Willy Rampf (Technical Director Chassis):
This was a good race for us with both cars finishing trouble
free. Jacques started 22nd but got stuck behind slower cars
for quite a while. After he was by them he made up many positions
despite a heavy car. He drove a good race and expecting better
than 12th was not realistic. Nick started from tenth and had
a very consistent race pace, thus enabling us to gain one
position thanks to our strategy on a circuit where overtaking
is difficult.
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