16/09/2007
NEWS STORY
David Coulthard: I had to stop due to a hydraulic related issue, I lost throttle control and power steering. On Friday the car failed in Eau Rouge, which is never good, but fortunately this time it happened on a straight, so I had more room to manoeuvre my car out of the way of the others. There's no way you can get it back to the pits in that situation, as you have no throttle control. The car was very heavy at the beginning of the race, so I was quite slow, but as the fuel came off, I found more performance. The car wasn't too good when exiting the corners today, or braking into the chicane and the hairpin; in fact there were a lot of problems which aren't usual for this car, so we need to try and understand what went wrong today.”
In line with many people, I'm shocked and saddened to hear of the loss to the McRae family, of father and son, and obviously we must acknowledge the other family that were on board the helicopter as well. Colin was a remarkable man who wore his heart on this sleeve and was the epitome of a racer; fearless and attacking, yet he remained true to his roots and grounded despite the international fame and recognition that he achieved. The world is a sorrier place without him.
Mark Webber: It's very good for us to get points today, it's not always easy for us these days and it was great to beat the other Renault team fair and square. David did great job acting as a buffer in front of Kubica, which assisted me. It was an enjoyable race this afternoon, although today my thoughts are of course with the McRae family and the terrible tragedy that happened yesterday.
Christian Horner: A good afternoon's work for Mark, who made the most of his strategy. I think seventh place was the optimum for us today, so it was a good result for him and the team. David was running to a different strategy and aided the team strategically by holding up Kubica for a number of laps. It was unfortunate for him to have what looks like a hydraulics failure, but he was running to schedule and it was disappointing that he wasn't able to capitalize on his good work and make it to the finish. Echoing the sentiments of Mark and David, it has been a tragic weekend for Motorsport losing one of the sports great champions. Our thoughts are with the families.
Fabrice Lom, Renault Principal Engineer, Track Support: We are very pleased to score two points today. Mark's performance confirmed what we have seen for the past few weeks: our car can perform well and the competition is very tight in this part of the field. David was on a difficult one stop strategy; he gave his maximum and helped the team by defending strongly against Kubica. Unfortunately he had a hydraulic failure and had to retire, which means we still have some work to do to improve the reliability of our package. That's what we will be working on next week as we will be testing in Jerez, our final test before the last three rounds of the 2007 season.
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