06/04/2010
NEWS STORY
All four teams using Cosworth CA2010 engines registered classified finishes in the Malaysian Grand Prix with AT&T Williams driver Nico Hulkenberg taking the chequered flag in tenth place and scoring his first Formula One World Championship point.
The German driver and his team-mate Rubens Barrichello had started Sunday's race from fifth and seventh positions on the grid respectively, having reached the final part of qualifying in Saturday's rain affected knockout session.
Virgin Racing celebrated their first Grand Prix finish with Lucas Di Grassi taking 14th position ahead of the HRT F1 team who had their first two car finish with Karun Chandhok and Bruno Senna in 15th and 16th. Jarno Trulli rounded out the classified finishers in the home Grand Prix for Malaysian-backed Lotus Racing, the team's third consecutive race finish.
Mark Gallagher, General Manager Cosworth F1 Business Unit: "We were very pleased to see Virgin Racing register their first classified race finish in Malaysia. We have worked closely with them, as with all Cosworth-powered teams, to provide the flexibility to conserve fuel without impacting significantly on power output, so we congratulate Lucas and the team for a great race. Well done to Nico Hulkenberg for picking up his first championship point and extending the run of points finishes for Williams-Cosworth. It was also great to see HRT get both cars to the end and for Lotus Racing to register a finish in their home event."
The oppressive heat and humidity of the Sepang International Circuit gave Cosworth the opportunity to evaluate its CA2010 engine in a different range of weather conditions following the outright heat of Bahrain and the comparatively cooler and wetter conditions in Australia just over a week ago. Although reliability continues to be in line with Cosworth's exacting standards, the company is not resting on its laurels where engine performance and fine-tuning is concerned.
Mark Gallagher: "We have now moved into a different phase of our programme, seeing scheduled engine changes across our four teams, with some engines that have been used previously in races now being used only in practice sessions. We have some engines running with close to 2,000kms accumulated during the opening race weekends. This is providing us with very useful information not only on the durability of the CA2010, but also on the overall experiences that the engines have been through. We always emerge from a race weekend with a job list in order to optimise the performance from the CA2010 as our teams constantly strive for performance gains or improvements in the installation. Although the engines are homologated, and thus development restricted, there are still many areas we can concentrate on to ensure that engines perform to their full potential. All the real time data we are gathering from our four teams is proving enormously helpful in this regard. It is clear that our engine manufacturer rivals have experienced some reliability issues over the first three race weekends, so good durability remains an important foundation of the CA2010 programme. With reliability comes the opportunity to focus on optimising performance in every area and the results of these first three Grands Prix have given us increased confidence in that area."