MF1 RACING
2006 San Marino GP Race Report
Tiago Monteiro (POR), #18
Chassis: M16-03
Starting Position: 19th
Classification / Laps Completed: 16th / 60 (+2 laps)
Fastest Lap: 1:27.160
Quote: "Another finish, which is important
of course, because every finish gives us more data to work
with. We had two strategy options, depending on how the start
went. Actually, it was our best start so far this season,
so I managed to stay in front of Sato and from that point
I was just pushing hard to follow the Torro Rossos. I couldn't
do that, but in that type of situation, you have to keep pushing
hard the whole race, because you never know what might happen
to those ahead of you. So you push to explore the potential
of the car and you push to improve your focus and concentration
over a race distance. It's actually not too bad, because we
learned a lot. Personally, I discover new things about the
car every time out. Unfortunately, we're in a situation where
we get overtaken, but we analyse this to see where our opponents
are quicker. Obviously, this is not where we want to be -
we would prefer to be fighting with the others - but I think
our pace is improving all the time. We just need a little
bit more, and we're almost there."
Christijan Albers (NED), #19
Chassis: M16-02
Starting Position: 20th
Classification / Laps Completed: Accident / 0 (+62 laps)
Fastest Lap: N/A
Quote: "For me, this was really a bad
end to the weekend. It's a shame, because we had a fantastic
start. On Friday, we were really quick; we were on the pace.
On Saturday morning, we were also pretty quick. And then the
bad luck started: we had a software problem on the engine
side that held us back in qualifying. For me, this was really,
really sad, because I felt we had a chance to make it into
the second qualifying heat, even though we still had a lot
of fuel in the car. And then, during the race, I felt I had
a reasonable start that ended up being wasted by an unnecessary
race incident. With all due respect to the Super Aguri drivers,
they are being much too aggressive in trying to jump ahead
of us at the start so that they can hold us up during the
race, as they've done in the past. They are taking too many
risks, and we saw today how dangerous this can be. I don't
understand this tactic, because I would have conceded the
position to (Ide) had he been in a position to take it. I
had a lot of fuel on board and driving to a certain strategy,
so I wasn't trying to hold anyone up. But instead, he just
pushed me off the road from behind. It's too bad, because
the car is severely damaged. The team worked very hard to
give me a good car this weekend, and they deserved a better
result than this."
Colin Kolles, Managing Director: "It
was not such a good weekend, to say the least. Tiago did a
good job to bring the car home under difficult circumstances,
after his car developed a problem. As for Christijan, well,
it's obvious what happened and it was certainly not his fault."
Dominic Harlow, Chief Race and Test Engineer:
"Thankfully, Christijan's OK after being shunted off
on the first lap. Sadly, it's just one of those things. Tiago
brought the car home in P16 and given the problems he had,
that was probably the best we could have hoped for. We've
got some things to work on to get ready for the next one,
but we're up for the challenge."
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