Both McLaren cars make it to the end at Imola

By Parminio
April 26 2004

Allthough it wasn't what we had hoped for, just seeing both cars make it to the end was a good step in the right direction for Mclaren.

McLaren-Mercedes finally managed to get both cars to the finish line at Imola yesterday for the first time this season. It wasn't what McLaren fans were hoping for, but at this stage of the game we'll take it.

Thanks to the retirement of Sato, Kimi Raikkonen managed to pick up his first point of the season by bringing it home in 8th. David Coulthard had an episode at the start clipping the back of a Renault, with the result of losing his front wing. That effectively put DC out of it, but he still managed to finish the race.

It's been a really hard season to swallow for McLaren fans everywhere, but at least we take a double finish out of this weekend. Moving on to Spain, we can only hope that our new found reliability will stay with us, and that just maybe we can get a few more improvements. McLaren, now lying 5th in the constructors standings, desperately need to score points to get out of the cellar. With the strength of BAR, Renault and Williams, that is not going to be easy.

In other news our driver for next year, Juan Pablo Montoya, made some rather choice comments after the race in the interview. In what can best be described as a 'cry me a river' statement, Juan said, ""Michael had a poor start, he was slow, I went to pass him and he closed the door twice then came straight at me and hit me and put me on the grass. He hit me on the side but there was no damage." He went on to say,"It is disappointing to have racing like that and I will be surprised it he gets away with it. I understand he has to defend his position but how far can he be allowed to do this?"

First off, this particular McLaren fan saw the replay several times, and never saw actual contact. What's more, is that just a half second later, after accusing Michael Schumacher of running him off the road, he ran his own teammate off the road going into the next corner.

One would hope that this is not the kind of hypocritical statements and attitude that will be coming to McLaren. If so, this particular McLaren fan would expect his stay to be a short one.