Bahrain Grand Prix – Race Round-Up
SAKHIR ACE
Panasonic Toyota Racing has secured its third consecutive
points finish of 2007 courtesy of Jarno Trulli’s fine
7th place at the Bahrain International Circuit. After the
mixed weather of the previous few days at Sakhir, the race
took place on a hot and sunny day with track temperatures
around 40 degrees Celsius. Jarno and team-mate Ralf Schumacher
lined up in 9th and 14th places respectively on the grid.
Both lost ground at the start before an early accident brought
out the safety car. But Jarno battled hard and made up places
by passing both Renaults on the way to two points. Ralf’s
day was tougher but he brought his car home in 12th place
to maintain the team’s 100 percent reliability record.
Toyota will now look to build on this solid start to the season
make up ground on the front-runners. The next major test is
scheduled for Barcelona beginning on April 30 in preparation
for the next round of the championship, the Spanish Grand
Prix, which will take place at the same circuit on May 13.
Jarno Trulli (Car 12, Chassis TF107/04)
Race Classification 7th Gap: +1m 21.371s Tyre Strategy: Soft
Soft Hard
Qualifying Classification 9th Time: 1m 34.154s (+1.502s in
Q3) Grid: 9th
“That was a very tough race for me and I did a great
job so I am happy both for myself and for the team. It’s
my job to resist pressure and this result was due to driving
experience and getting the best out of the car. The pit stops
and the strategy were perfect and the car’s balance
was good. But the problem was that it was very hard to battle
in traffic because everyone else was quicker than me on the
straights. I had to defend and attack at the same time and
it is hard to attack if you are slower than the cars you are
fighting with when it comes to top speed. So it was a great
race and it feels like a victory. I would like to dedicate
the two points to my son Enzo, who is celebrating his second
birthday today.”
Ralf Schumacher (Car 11, Chassis TF107/03)
Race Classification 12th Gap: +1 lap Tyre Strategy: Soft
Soft Hard
Qualifying Classification 14th Time: 1m 33.294s (+1.935s
in Q3) Grid: 14th
“It’s been a difficult weekend for me since the
beginning and it was another hard day out there starting from
so far back. Jarno’s points show that it was not a bad
race but I made my life hard and struggled to adapt the car
to suit me since Friday. Today we didn’t get away well
off the line and that meant I was always going to be in traffic.
If you have a less than perfect set-up then it is difficult
to make up ground. So it was not a good day but we can’t
change that. Now we need to work hard and analyse everything.
We have a new aerodynamic package coming to Barcelona so we
hope that brings us further forward.
John Howett – TMG President
“That was a very tough but exciting race for us and
Jarno did an unbelievable job. He overtook when he had to
and he defended his position when he had to. In the end he
was able to pass cars, including both Renaults, while under
pressure from several cars behind him. When we saw that he
was fast we went for a long second stint and that should have
enabled him to pass the Red Bulls too. That was despite a
top speed which was down compared to qualifying so we will
have to analyse the reasons for that. The starts did not go
as well as expected either and we lost positions with both
cars. We have to solve that because there’s no point
in fighting so hard in qualifying if we are going to lose
out off the line. Ralf always had a hard race from where he
was on the grid but he did well to bring the car home. Now
we have to help him and make the car more driveable for him.
Overall it was a solid race and we finished where we thought
we were after qualifying – the fourth fastest team –
so it’s good to see concrete evidence. This weekend
we have shown a continued improvement of our performance after
Melbourne and Sepang. So although we are not where we want
to be and we still have to improve the overall pace, it’s
encouraging.”
|
