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Singapore GP: Post Race press conference

NEWS STORY
26/09/2010

Fernando, another pole to flag victory but you had to work extremely hard for this one in every sense. Just 0.2 seconds the winning margin.
Fernando Alonso: Yeah, very good stuff. The race was long and with the safety car problems and also the people we were lapping especially at the end we found a group of five cars. They lost one lap and it was difficult to lap them. There was a yellow flag on the straight because of the Lotus problem, the car on fire, so we could not overtake there so, it was difficult to manage the gap with the guys in front. Not to overtake under the yellow, anything like that, so a lot of precaution in the last couple of laps, taking it very easy. We know how difficult it is to overtake here, so I just controlled the gap with Sebastian as much as I could and not taking any risk.

Sebastian, you pushed Fernando to the absolute limit today but it wasn't to be. Did you ever think at any stage of the race that it might be on, particularly in the closing stages?
Sebastian Vettel: Well, obviously it was the only chance I had. Unfortunately in the beginning I had to let him go a little bit and then towards the end of the first stint the soft tyres were pretty much at the end. The car was sliding a lot. We came in at the same lap. Unfortunately at the pit stop I had a little mistake but I think it would have been very close. That is the story of the whole race. I tried to push him as hard as I could into a mistake. He didn't do a major mistake so as he said it is difficult to overtake here and it would have been too risky, so in the end we got away with second, good points. But the most important is that the car is quick, competitive all weekend. There was a bit missing yesterday and probably that was what I was missing today. I had a very good start, so I think we made good progress on that. In the end it is good to get good points for the team. It helps us a lot in the Constructors' Championship and in the Drivers' Championship everything is still very much open.

Mark, you took a big gamble on tyre strategy early on in the race. It paid off just, but what about that collision with Lewis Hamilton?
Mark Webber: Well, first of all back to the start. The start was pretty good, so thanks very much to the team. As Seb touched on he had a pretty good one too, so that is good for us to get away and sets the base of the race in a better fashion. Settled into the first stint. Safety car early. Then as you said we decided to pit. I questioned the team to start with and they said it is the right thing, let's have a go. We pitted and I thought 'oh, this is going to be a long stint on the primes'. We came back out and when we re-queued up on the safety car I thought 'okay that's not too bad'. We were in a reasonable position. I passed a few guys and then I got to Rubens (Barrichello) and he was driving very well. I couldn't clear him. Then another re-start and it is very difficult to get away cleanly when you have got the backmarkers involved. I got caught up behind one of the Virgins. I don't know which driver it was. He was doing his best but Lewis got a big run of me. It was pretty harsh for me to have to clear those guys. He could set me up and have a crack at me. Unfortunately we made contact. The contact was similar to what he had in Monza with Felipe (Massa) and it could have easily been my front right tyre over as well. It was not desirable. It was a key part of the race for me to keep him out and there was contact, so it is not something you want to do all the time. After that I had a pretty decent vibration in the front end of the car, very worried if the car would get home to the end. But these two guys drove a fantastic race today. All weekend they drove very well and it was a good race for everyone to see and I am very happy with third.

Fernando, two hours driving in these temperatures. Tell us how hard that was physically and how much this win means for you today.
FA: Well, it was very difficult. We knew that before we came here. We know Singapore physically is maybe the toughest race of the season. Two hours with this humidity in a street circuit with no time to breathe, 24, 25 corners, so it was tough to drive. This wins means a lot. Coming from Monza we knew that that was a unique lay-out, so we wanted to confirm in a normal track – even if Singapore is still a very special lay-out as well – but with more downforce that the car is performing well. We did it, so this win means a lot to keep in the fight in the championship. We know there are still four races to go but it seems we can be competitive in any track, so thanks to the team. Great job at the factory. Great job at the track as well getting 100 per cent of our potential all the time, so let's see in the remaining races. Forza Ferrari!

Sebastian, tell us in more detail about the start. Your move and Fernando's response into turn one.
SV: Well, my move was pretty straightforward. I just went straight. I could see immediately that I had a very good start. It would have been enough for turn one but obviously Fernando closed and went to the inside, so there was no way to go. It would have made the angle for the first corner pretty tight, so I decided to go on the right and try to catch more speed for the rest of the lap. Yeah, that was that. As Mark said and I before, very good efforts on the starts. We have been criticised, wrongly I think, in the past but it is good to come here on a street circuit where it is always tricky to get the right settings for the start and we did both very good starts, so happy with that.

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