Fahrerstimmen – Tag 3

“After the DNF in Hungary, this last push in the championship couldn’t have started better for me; this victory was the perfect way to bounce back. Spa is always one of the most challenging races on the calendar, and I’m ecstatic that I’m now able to tick it off and say that I’ve won here. “At the start, I was able to pace myself and maintain the gap – every time the cars behind increased their pace, I was able to answer. Then, when the conditions changed, I had a wide moment at Turn Eight – and I was on the edge of my seat! Fortunately, I got out of it, took a step back, regained my focus, and took control again. I was so relieved to cross the line at the end of the race – it was an overwhelming feeling! “I feel really sorry for Jenson, though. He did a great job. I got around Turn One, looked in my mirrors, saw him picking up places, and thought, ‘That’s good, that’s good.’ Then he got up to second, and I thought, ‘That’s fantastic – another opportunity for a one-two.’ Then, cruelly, he was taken out through no fault of his own – which was really unfortunate for him, and for the team, because he did everything he could to get us the most points in the constructors’ championship today. But he’ll bounce back even stronger. “It may sound an obvious thing to say, but I’ll say it anyway: I love racing. It’s in my blood, and I missed it so much during the summer break. So to finally get a win here at Spa – in the trickiest of conditions – is fantastic. I couldn’t have done it without the team though. Without them putting in such a great effort, we wouldn’t be here today. “It almost feels like this is my first win – it’s just phenomenal!”

“The start was a mess, it wasn’t ideal to lose that many positions, but fortunately it’s not Monaco or Barcelona where the positions often don’t change during the race. I was able to overtake a few guys on the first few laps and get some of the positions back – I knew the race would be quite long after that and to get second place was a good result. It was very challenging in the last part of the Grand Prix and it was difficult to keep the car on track. I can’t believe the top three qualifiers finished on the podium with all the changing conditions! It was a good day for me. It was unfortunate for the team that we didn’t get some more points, but we’re still leading the Constructors’ Championship and hopefully we will do in Monza.”

Dieses Rennen war ein voller Erfolg und der krönende Abschluss eines großartigen Wochenendes, in dessen Verlauf wir in jeder einzelnen Session stets zu den Schnellsten gehörten. Niemand hat damit gerechnet, dass wir hier in Spa-Francorchamps auf Augenhöhe mit McLaren und Red Bull kämpfen würden. Ich denke, wir können mit unserer Vorstellung bestens zufrieden sein. Gleich zu Beginn des Grand Prix erwiesen sich die Streckenverhältnisse als überaus brisant. Der Asphalt war feucht, bevor das Safety-Car herauskam, und blieb es auch anschließend. Ich lag bereits auf dem vierten Rang, als Sebastian Vettel und Jenson Button kollidierten – dies geschah zu einem Zeitpunkt, als ich klar schneller war als der Titelverteidiger vor mir. Danach hatte ich freie Fahrt und konnte das Potenzial meines Renault R30 voll ausschöpfen, das Auto fühlte sich optimal an. Mark Webber ging kurz vor mir an die Box, um ,Prime‘-Reifen auszufassen. Als ich an der Reihe war, erledigten meine Mechaniker einen fantastischen Job, so dass ich vor dem Australier ins Rennen zurückkehrte – auch wenn es in der Bergaufpassage hinter der ,Eau Rouge‘ sehr eng zwischen mir und Mark zuging. Aber ich konnte meine Position verteidigen und mich anschließend etwas absetzen. Als erneut Regen einsetzte, wurde es enorm rutschig. Auf dem Weg zum Wechsel auf Regen-Rennreifen konnte ich auf Lewis Hamilton aufschließen. Bei der Einfahrt in die Boxengasse habe ich mir extra vorgenommen, es nicht zu übertreiben – zeitgleich musste ich aber auch verschiedene Einstellungen über die Bedienknöpfe des Lenkrads korrigieren. Dies hat mich etwas abgelenkt, und als ich wieder nach vorne schaute, war der Bremspunkt zum Halten vor meinen Mechanikern schon vorbei. Deshalb rutschte ich mit blockierenden Rädern knapp an der optimalen Stopp-Position vorbei. Gottlob wurde niemand verletzt. Dieser Zwischenfall kostete mich eine Platzierung. Aber ich glaube, in einem Grand Prix, bei dem es so einfach war, einen gravierenden Fehler zu begehen, können wir mit dem dritten Rang mehr als zufrieden sein – ich habe meinen Startplatz ins Ziel gebracht. Und die Schnelligkeit, die wir auf der Strecke bewiesen haben, stimmt für den Rest der Saison mehr als zuversichtlich

“I think this is a positive result and, given the way the race went and the accidents that put Vettel and Button out of the game, we can even say we were a bit lucky. This weekend, Red Bull and McLaren were stronger than us, but we worked well as a team, making the right choices before and during the race. Our set-up was a bit more efficient in the dry, while we suffered a bit in the wet, especially in the middle sector, while in the first two we were reasonably competitive. Now we go to Monza, for our home race: we hope to do well at a track where speed and stability under braking count for a lot. We will continue to fight right to the end, even if the situation in the championship is ever more compromised.”

Another fifth place so I am very pleased as I started in P8. I think that was the best we could do. It was very tricky conditions out there and you never knew what would happen with the weather. When the rain came it was sometimes light in places and heavy in others and I had to really concentrate to drive it home safely. Of course I was racing closely so I had to keep pushing, particularly after the safety car periods when the field bunched up, so we had some great racing and overtaking. The upgrades worked well and we can still improve – it was just the start of the development, which looks good for the next race in Monza as well.

„Meine Regenabstimmung funktionierte erst gegen Ende des Rennens und ich verbesserte mich nach der Safety Car Phase um zwei Plätze. Der sechste Platz heute geht in Ordnung; das ist das Beste, das wir uns an diesem Wochenende erhoffen konnten. Die Zweikämpfe mit Michael machten Spaß. Wir respektieren einander und waren vorsichtig und das war OK. Wir sahen heute wieder besser aus, aber wir müssen weiter daran arbeiten uns zu steigern, um die Saison gut abzuschließen.“

„Ich bin mit dem heutigen Rennen recht zufrieden und freue mich besonders für unser Team. Von den Startplätzen 14 für Nico und 21 für mich ist es ein schönes Ergebnis. Die Plätze sechs und sieben sind nicht schlecht und bringen uns 14 Punkte in der Konstrukteurs-WM. Die Nummer 7 gehört für mich irgendwie zu Spa, das ist für mich etwas Besonderes. Nur bei noch stärkeren Wetterkapriolen hätten wir aus meiner Sicht besser abschneiden können. Nico und ich sind uns auf der Strecke heute zweimal sehr nahe gekommen. Beim ersten Mal überholte ich ihn in einem schönen Duell. Das zweite Mal war nach dem Re-Start, als ich in Eau Rouge wegen eines Autos vor mir kurz vom Gas gehen musste und er an mir vorbei flog. Spa war fast so unterhaltsam wie ich es mir erhofft hatte.“

„Es war ein sehr schwieriges Rennen, aber für mich hat alles gut funktioniert. Das Team hat sehr gute Entscheidungen getroffen und die richtigen Reifen zum richtigen Zeitpunkt gewählt. Meine Boxenstopps haben auch gut geklappt. Phasenweise haben sich die Streckenbedingungen von Runde zu Runde verändert, das war nicht einfach. Vor allem nach dem schlechten Qualifying gestern bin ich sehr froh, dass ich keine Fehler gemacht, das Auto ins Ziel gebracht und von Platz 17 aus vier weitere Punkte geholt habe.“

Das oberste Ziel für mich an diesem Renn-Sonntag lautete: Punkte erringen. Also bin ich mit Rang acht und zwei WM-Zählern mehr als zufrieden. Gleich beim Start kam ich gut weg und attackierte hart, um schnell die ersten Positionen aufzuholen – ein Plan, der funktionierte. Auch wenn die Konditionen auf der Strecke wirklich anspruchsvoll waren und die Wahl der richtigen Reifen eine komplizierte Angelegenheit darstellte, so konnte ich den Grand Prix richtig genießen. Aus taktischer Sicht hat das Renault F1 Team einige wirklich clevere Entscheidungen getroffen – zum Beispiel, dass ich mit den Slicks sehr lange unterwegs war. Ich denke, wir haben unsere Chancen bestmöglich genutzt. Nach meinem Missgeschick im gestrigen Qualifying konnte ich beweisen, dass ich schnell genug bin, um konstant unter die besten Zehn zu fahren. Wenn ich am nächsten Rennwochenende das Abschlusstraining besser auf die Reihe bekomme, dann muss ich auch während des Grand Prix nicht mehr so viele Autos überholen, um nach vorne zu stoßen. Der neue ,F-Schacht‘, den wir hier in Belgien erstmals einsetzten, erwies sich als großartige Hilfe. Durch diese Neuentwicklung war ich auf den Geraden schnell genug, um zum Beispiel den Zweikampf mit Nico Rosberg für mich zu entscheiden. Das wird uns auch in den bevorstehenden WM-Läufen noch sehr zugute kommen.

I’m really pleased to be back in the points again this race for the first time since Canada. We’ve always been pushing really hard so to get a point here, and to make it a double points scoring finish for the team, is a really good reward for all the hard work we’ve done over the past few weeks. We decided to pit earlier and do a long stint with the hard tyres and it was a pretty good decision as we had a good pace on this set and were in P11, not that far from getting into the points. But then Vettel tried to overtake me at the last corner and took my front wing off. We lost more than 30secs changing the wing and without this I am pretty sure we could have finished in eighth or higher. But the race pace was still good, the car has been consistent and better than it has been all weekend so we could be proud of that. I’m now looking forward to my home race in 15 days time in Italy.

„Es war ein sehr interessantes Rennen. Nachdem ich als Letzter losgefahren bin, sollte ich mich über Platz zwölf nicht beklagen. Aber zwei Runden vor Schluss war ich Zehnter, also gerade so in den Punkten. Ich war auf Regenreifen, und der Regen war einfach nicht stark genug, es war nicht genug Wasser auf der Fahrbahn, um diese Reifen am Leben zu halten. Sie haben sehr schnell abgebaut, und dann habe ich einen Fehler gemacht, als ich zu Vitaly Petrov aufschliessen wollte. Ich bin im Kies gelandet und habe zwei Positionen verloren. Nichtsdestotrotz war die Entscheidung für Regenreifen richtig. Wir mussten heute unsere Chancen suchen. Bei meinem ersten Boxenstopp war es im Grunde ähnlich. Wir haben auf Intermediates gesetzt, mussten aber bald zurück auf Slicks wechseln. Aber, wie gesagt, wir mussten auch mal etwas riskieren.“

“I managed to get a very good start, but then at the first corner, someone ran into me, which cut my left rear tyre and damaged the diffuser, so I tried all sorts of things like locking the differential and changing the front wing settings to compensate, as I was oversteering a huge amount. It cost me a lot in terms of pace, because at times the car was undriveable. So unfortunately, I could not do better than this, which is a shame, as this was a race where I could have been in the hunt for points. That’s racing.”

“I have had a good weekend and already I was happy with my performance in qualifying yesterday while today, I had the most exciting race of my career. It was very difficult to make the right call on tyre choice. I think that within our team’s potential, today’s performance was not too bad and I am delighted to have picked up another point. I can’t wait for Monza now and the chance to put on a good show for all the people from our factory who will be there to watch the race.”

Pretty early on in the race I had a throttle control problem which made the car very difficult to handle, so we made an unscheduled stop, but the engine died in the box and had to be re-started. As a result I dropped position and then had to cope in the rain without the full engine control, which caused some spins. We took some tyre gambles at the end to try and recover something.

“What happened, happened and we can’t change it now. Obviously I’m not proud of it, I lost the car going over the bump as I was braking and unfortunately hit Jenson, so he couldn’t continue. I’m sorry for him. We’ll have to see what we can do at the next races.”

“I had a bit of a problem at the start when the engine bogged down, and I activated the anti-stall, but I was already being passed by the time I could get up to speed. The rain had started and unfortunately I damaged my front wing in the last turn so I had to pit. We took a gamble with the inters but the rain stopped, so I had to come back in and I lost out to the group ahead of me. After that it was a question of doing the best job I could, and keeping us in with a chance of taking advantage of the rain at the end, and as it turned out we managed to pick up a few places at the end and finish 16th.”

“A very good race overall. I’m very pleased with my drive and the team did a great job. They were very difficult driving conditions due to the weather changing so much from dry to half wet to full wet during a whole race. The team did a great job calling me at the correct moment and choosing the correct tyres. From my point of view it is very clear that Kovalainen cut the chicane at turn 5 and we have brought this to the attention of the race officials. Hopefully we will know more about this soon.”

“Quite an eventful race, I have to say. I got a good start but again someone pushed me off the track and I lost two places. Then when Barrichello and Alonso had their incident I had to go wide and I went through the 50 metre board and damaged my front wing. I had to pit straight away and I lost quite a lot of time to the others. I then had to catch up to Trulli and Lucas again and at the end I took the gamble of having wet tyres which didn’t pay off and the rain came just too late - I’ve been too unlucky in the races this year. They were difficult conditions over the weekend, which made for quite an interesting race. It paid off for us in qualifying but not in the race.”

“It was pretty exciting out there, an eventful race where lots of things happened, but that’s normal for Spa! At the start I went wide to avoid Heikki and unfortunately was overtaken by a couple of other cars. After that I was struggling a bit in the early stages with my rear tyres overheating – fortunately they came back so I could started pushing and managed to pull away from the guys behind, so that was a good stint until the rain came. I had quite a big margin over my nearest competitor so I was looking pretty good, but then the safety car came out. At the restart I was following the other cars but obviously the visibility was very poor and I made a bit of an error on a high speed corner, touched the white line with the rear end of the car and it just slipped away from me, which meant I lost places. I continued, but then the race was over from there. I’m glad we got both cars home, and it’s good to see we’ve still got an advantage over our nearest rivals, so bring on Monza!”

“A lot happened in the race, where I had a good start and I could win some positions. It was difficult to push on the option tyres, so we changed on the primes. At the end of the race, the rain came back and we needed to change the tyres and played it as a gamble and changed to wets. With the low intensity in the beginning of this rain shower, the tyres got used too hard and started to grain. So, I lost a bit of performance when the rain was heavy. But I am happy and I want to thank the team for being able to finish the tough race again.”

“It was a bit of an unlucky race for us unfortunately. We had a really good start, probably the best we’ve done. But then into the first corner it got a bit tight, they got my front wing broken. So we came in and put the intermediate tyres which we need to change back after one lap as the rain stopped. One lap later, the rear left suspension failed. So we had everything going against us today. But this is how it goes in motor racing, we just have to look forward to Monza and hopefully it will be better there.”

“The first of the seven “finals” went badly for me and for two of the other five finalists, while the remaining two got the maximum results: that means we will have to make up the ground lost today somewhere else. At the start, I immediately made up some places and the signs were that I could have a good race. Then, I found myself in the wrong place at the wrong time, when Rubens could not control his car under braking and crashed into me. I came straight back to the pits to change the tyres and to check the car was alright, when we fitted intermediate tyres, expecting more persistent and harder rain, but that was not the case. Yesterday we were hoping for rain, but when it came it was already too late to be of much use to me; on the contrary it prevented me from getting the chance to overtake the cars which would have had to stop to fit the soft tyres. Then I went off the track, when I went over a kerb and that was my race over: a shame even if the points I could have brought home would not have been a lot. It is very disappointing, because this is a bad result, but it does not mean I have given up on my chances of winning the title.”

“It was looking really good this afternoon. I got up to second easily enough, but my left-hand front-wing endplate had been damaged on lap one, which meant I had to dial maximum angle into it, and that made the rear twitchy without giving me any more front. “As a result, it was pretty tricky to keep the others behind, but I was having a good fight in the wet conditions, and I seemed to be able to find grip better than the other people around me. I was doing a decent job of keeping my position, and doing it fairly. “Then, as everyone knows, I had an incident with Sebastian [Vettel]. I certainly didn’t brake any earlier than usual. All I know is I suddenly felt a big bang in the sidepod, which ripped the radiator out, and then I lost drive. “I’ve watched it on TV now, and I’d say it was a very strange incident. Clearly, he didn’t do it on purpose, and I gather he’s now apologised, but I have to say I’ve got no idea what he was doing. It’s a massive blow to my world championship hopes. “All I can do now is look forward to Monza. I love that track, and I’ll be doing my best to score a lot of points there.”

Despite my experience, it was very difficult to know how wet the track was on the opening lap, but it was fully wet when I came into Blanchimont. I was closing the door on Rosberg and when I touched the brakes, even though it was quite early, it wasn’t sufficient to stop the car. The car went straight on into Alonso, for which I'm sorry. It's also sad for the team. We've had such a positive weekend that a good result would have been a nice conclusion. Despite not having a good outcome in my 300th race, I’m confident we will go well in the 301st!