Monaco; Rubens Barrichello Race Q&A

Rubens, a great start which defined your race. But you had a problem with the seat belt in stint two.

Yeah, once again just like Barcelona I had a great start and I was able to have a run on Kimi. I was running at tremendous pace. But possibly I was just too close to Jenson as losing that little bit of aerodynamic I was struggling a little bit more without the air in front and I grained the rear tyres. From 16s I started to do 20s and then Jenson was gaining like three or four seconds a lap and that defined the race pretty much. If you look back the race was defined yesterday as it is a great momentum going when you start from the front. I had a great weekend. The car was perfect the whole way through. It was a shame we had the graining. On the second stint my seat belts started to get looser and looser and I could hear them going clank, clank. I was just getting loose, so I had to start driving differently. I had to send brakes to the front as when you brake you are just moving and you get to the pedal and you lock rear wheels more. I had a great time, really. It was not as easy as it looks from the outside, so I am proud of what we achieved today.

You mentioned the problem with your rear tyres, what was that?

Well, I was just mentioning it to Jenson. We had a different reading from many of the others. We had the option tyre and we thought the option was going to be the tyre to use for three quarters of the race really. Then, all of a sudden, we saw some of the others using the other tyre. As you could see it was the tyre to have to begin with; we pulled away, it was great. I was comfortably running behind Jenson but probably by running that close it just affected my tyre a little bit more because you lose a bit of aerodynamics and you start to slide. I had the graining on the rear, but graining badly, because I started saying that the pressure must have gone up and I couldn't keep up the pace. They said we can see on the TV that the graining has started. With the graining I lost four seconds myself, so it was great strategy to recover from that when Kimi stopped. I came in a lap later, much earlier than I was expected and after that it was fine but by then Jenson was 16s ahead. We had very similar pace; sometimes I was better, sometimes he was but basically the race was lost during that graining phase.

How close did Kimi get to you?

Well, I was very lucky that it is just impossible to overtake at this place, even though he had the KERS. If you brake in the middle of the line, Monaco is really impossible. There's 101 percent of a chance of not overtaking, so it was lucky that it was this place where I had the graining.

Your fourth second place here; is that a little frustrating?

I think it's something like that, yeah. I wish I had won some races here but I'm looking at it differently this time. Of course Jenson is 16 points ahead but I have to cover as many points as possible while I'm not winning, so if I do start winning then it's a different matter. It's the championship that matters right now and as I said, Jenson is on a flier. He's not making any mistakes which is really good for him, it's really good for the team. I'm pushing him as hard as I can. I wanted to win for myself and for the team and this couldn't be any better for the team, to be honest, because we're pushing each other, we're fair to each other and we're having a wonderful time. He's having a bit more fun than I am because he takes the trophy home but I am pushing hard, I won't stop until the very final race.

Do you think the car suits Jenson more than you and is there a particular track where you think you can have the edge over him?

At the beginning of the season I think the car suited him a little bit more, especially given the problems that I've been having with the rear brakes being too hot. I had to run without the wheel covers and he could run with them. But since the upgrade in Barcelona, it came a little bit my way and it has helped me very much. I'm in the game pretty much. I think the car will suit me in Turkey, Silverstone… no, it can suit me anywhere. I don't think that a good driver can say I'm not doing well because the car is not suitable for me. If you're good enough, you just have to adapt to the car and that's it. It could come your way a little bit and could go away from you a little bit but at the end of the day you have to adapt to it and that's it.