BMW Race Reactions: good pace, disappointing result
By BMW Sauber F1
July 12 2009
The BMW Sauber F1 Team didn't score any points at its home grand prix after Nick Heidfeld came tenth at the Nürburgring and Robert Kubica finished 14th.
Nick Heidfeld - 10th: "I am very disappointed because today we had the speed to score points, which obviously hasn't always been the case this year, but several things just went wrong. The start was good for the first few metres and I tried to improve my position, but Adrian Sutil's defending was very tough. Then the first stint wasn't easy with the heavy fuel load. But during the middle stint I was able to catch up until I lost some time behind slower cars, including that of Robert. Then I had bad luck at the pit stop, as we were ready to leave the pit, but then a Renault came in and I had to wait. It felt as if it took ages before the lollipop went up."
Robert Kubica - 14th: "I had a very good start and gained a lot of positions on the first lap. Although I had a lot of tyre degradation, the first stint was quite good. Nico Rosberg was on primes in front of me and he was really quick. I changed to primes for the second stint and after a couple of laps I noticed that the tyre pressures were not right. Unfortunately this cost me a lot of lap time and I still had around 20 laps to go. Everybody in the team is working very hard and we are getting slightly better each weekend, but there is still a big gap to the front runners."
Mario Theissen (BMW Motorsport Director): "The race result reflects our performance throughout the whole weekend. For us it was a race without anything special happening apart from Nick´s second pitstop. This was because after taking on fuel and fitting new tyres he had to let Nelsinho Piquet pass. Because of this he lost valuable time, and his chance for P8 and a point. However, we had no technical problems."
Willy Rampf (Head of Engineering): "We started the race from 11th and 16th so, as nothing extraordinary happened, we could not expect more. Robert was able to move up a couple of positions on the first lap. We could not take advantage of this as Robert's prime tyres lacked of grip during his second stint. Nick lost a couple of positions at the start, but fought back during the second half of the race. One point would have been possible for Nick, but during his second pit stop he had to wait for Nelsinho Piquet who was coming in. Subsequently because of this we lost decisive time on Heikki Kovalainen and Timo Glock."
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Robert was at crawling pace that time due to tyre problems. Amazing how we still get the preasures wrong. He said his pressures were above the limit after 4 laps in 2nd stint, which was confirmed by team telemetry.
regards tt
...He (Kubica) was also asked about him letting Heidfeld go past and whether he was told over the radio that Nick is faster. He simply said "no".
Racing against the machine!
KUB +48.837 11. HEI +50.567
lap 37
10. KUB +51.308 11. HEI +52.382
lap 38
9. KUB +53.243 10. HEI +53.528
lap 39
9. KUB +54.954 10. HEI +55.675
lap 40
9. KUB +55.888 10. HEI +56.113
lap 41
8. HEI +55.994 9. KUB +58.812
no doubt Nick was held up by Robert for few laps
In the post race interview (as Barteks point out) he was aksed whether team told him he is holding up Nick and he said "no"
Quote:J-Raid
Zagloba, in fact Kubica refused to let Nick go by, as reflect both the time NH was stuck behind, and this:
...He (Kubica) was also asked about him letting Heidfeld go past and whether he was told over the radio that Nick is faster. He simply said "no".
Did he relay refuse ...never seen RK deliberately holding any one to the contrary always to soft for ppl let him by easly...
All in all my point wasn't to put Robert in a bad light, but just to correct those who said he had been extremely gentle at letting Nick go by. Obviously the data Gemm published shows he didn't make things easy to NH.
And no, I'm not saying he should have; after all its racing for position, but I did have to prove wrong who criticized Nick for not letting Robert go back in China08 and contrasting it with yesterday's race.
PS: Kubica's tyre pressure problems were that they were way too high.
Racing against the machine!
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2009:07:13:17:10:11 by J-Raid.
What did they do, just paint the front wing and call it an up grade.
Robert's pi$$ed off and has reason. Nick is being old consistent Nick, just trying to make a good thing out of a bad thing.They need some serious changes and it looks like it may not happen.
I'll keep watching and hoping but there's very little promise to grab on to at this point.
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