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2005 French Formula 1 Grand Prix
What the teams and drivers said - Sunday

Team and Driver Quotes following the Race

(selected team quotes, for a full team and driver report click on the team name)

Renault ( Fernando Alonso - 1st, Giancarlo Fisichella - 6th )

Flavio Briatore, Managing Director
"The team gave a fantastic performance today, and Michelin did the same – after the events in Indianapolis, it was great to see them come back so strongly and dominate the weekend. Fernando drove a perfect race, but we are sorry for Fisico and the problems he had again, which were our fault. But even though he did not finish as high as he could have done, his points have made the difference this afternoon, and helped us build the lead to McLaren and Ferrari. Finally, we are delighted for the spectators, and our colleagues who came to the race today – we were proud to offer them this victory."

Full Team and Driver Race Report  Back to Top

McLaren Mercedes ( Kimi Raikkonen - 2nd, Juan Pablo Montoya - Retired )

RON DENNIS
"Kimi's race from 13th on the grid was complimented by an excellent strategy, and the resulting second place was a good reward for the efforts from the entire team. Juan Pablo's first retirement of the year was as frustrating for us as it was for him especially since a podium finish was a certainty. It is clear to everybody that we have a very competitive car and of course we are already looking forward to the British Grand Prix at Silverstone next week."

Full Team and Driver Race Report  Back to Top

Ferrari ( Michael Schumacher - 3rd, Rubens Barrichello - 9th )

Jean Todt: “This was a very disappointing race. This weekend we were among the best in qualifying, but we were unable to match that in the race. Michael finished third and clearly could not have done better. The cars ahead of him were simply quicker. After just a few laps, Rubens found he had a problem with the brakes, which made his race very difficult. As the laps went by, he kept dropping down the order, ending up outside the points. We are disappointed because we hoped to be much more competitive. Now we must analyse the race, along with our technical partners, to try and understand why things did not go the way we had expected.”

Full Team and Driver Race Report  Back to Top

BAR Honda ( Jenson Button - 4th, Takuma Sato - 11th )

GIL DE FERRAN, SPORTING DIRECTOR "We are quite happy with what turned out to be quite a competitive race for us. Jenson did a great job to finish fourth, with good strategic work from our engineers during the race. Taku was very strong early in the race but unfortunately his race became incident-filled, which prevented him from scoring any points. We clearly need more pace but overall not a bad day for us and we are looking forward to Silverstone next weekend. Our thanks to Honda for continuing to develop such a strong engine and to Michelin who, after a difficult last race, bounced back with a win and seven cars in the top eight places."

Full Team and Driver Race Report  Back to Top

Toyota ( Jarno Trulli - 5th, Ralf Schumacher - 7th )

Tsutomu Tomita - Team Principal "We had high expectations for today's race, so I feel slightly frustrated with this result. Still, we managed to bring both cars home in the points and both drivers did well too so we can be happy with that. Both Jarno and Ralf made good starts, but our race pace wasn't as strong as we hoped because they were both struggling for rear grip, especially when the cars were heavy after the first pit stops. It was a tight call on strategy here, but we changed Ralf from three planned stops to two and he gained a place so that worked out. For him to take 7th place after going out first in qualifying was a good effort. It is a pity that we could not hold onto the podium with Jarno, but it is a sign of the progress we've made as a team that we can be slightly disappointed with both cars scoring a total of six world championship points. Still, we have a long way to go."

Full Team and Driver Race Report  Back to Top

Sauber ( Jacques Villeneuve - 8th, Felipe Massa - Retired )

Peter Sauber (Team Principal): "This was a championship point that we were able to fight for, so congratulations to Jacques. It was an important point, because it was only the third time we have scored here at Magny-Cours. There are always two perspectives after a race: points and performance. Besides scoring again, we also demonstrated a step forward in performance. I hope that continues at Silverstone next week, where hopefully Felipe will enjoy better fortune after his strong race this afternoon."

Full Team and Driver Race Report  Back to Top

Red Bull ( David Coulthard - 10th, Christian Klien - Retired )

Christian Horner, Sporting Director: “We’ll have to look into the failure on Christian’s car in a bit more detail, as we don’t have the feedback on that yet. David drove a very aggressive race, but got stuck behind traffic, which he eventually managed to clear. After that, his pace was competitive, especially during the second half of the race. He set some good lap times and repeated the performance he showed in the free practice. I think the thing that hurt us most here was starting so far back on the grid and that’s definitely something we need to work on. We’ve discovered a small brake problem yesterday, which was partly responsible for that, and it’s something we’ll need to sort out before Silverstone next weekend.”

Full Team and Driver Race Report  Back to Top

Williams BMW ( Mark Webber - 12th, Nick Heidfeld - 14th )

Sam Michael (Technical Director, WilliamsF1): It was a disappointing race for the team. The performance was not our normal level and we will make the neccessary investigations back at the factory. We also had mechanical problems on both cars that we could also see on the data on the pit- wall. We now need to disassemble and reassemble the cars to confirm what parts have failed in the drive line.

Full Team and Driver Race Report  Back to Top

Jordan ( Tiago Monteiro - 13th, Narain Karthikeyan - 15th )

ADRIAN BURGESS, SPORTING DIRECTOR
“Tiago did an extremely good job as usual. He is now at ten out of ten finishes, which is really impressive for a rookie. Now we need to carry on the development of the new EJ15B and hopefully we will be able to provide our drivers with a faster car to show their talent. Narain had a very good start and was running in front of Klien and Tiago but unfortunately from a very early point, before our first pit stop, we started having gearbox problems which forced Narain to change the way he was driving and cost him a lot of lap time. However, he succeeded in bringing the car home. This will help our qualifying starting order for the next event.”

Full Team and Driver Race Report  Back to Top

Minardi ( Christijan Albers - Retired, Patrick Friesacher - Retired )

PAUL STODDART, Team Principal, Minardi Cosworth
“It’s disappointing that both cars retired today as the result of the valve caps not being refitted to the left rear tyres after the drivers’ second pit stops. In co-operation with our tyre partner, Bridgestone, we will be investigating the issue further, to understand why it happened and to ensure there is no repeat of the problem. It’s a pity for both drivers, and in particular, for Christijan, who was having a good race with the Jordans before his retirement.”

Full Team and Driver Race Report  Back to Top

Bridgestone

Hisao Suganuma – Technical Manager – Bridgestone Motorsport “A disappointing result to not see Michael higher up the podium but it was a well earned third place. Rubens had a good start, gaining a place early on, but unfortunately did not have a strong race. After a strong qualifying result yesterday it was a shame to not get more from the race. I am also disappointed for both the Minardi drivers today. The valve cap on both their left rear tyres was not replaced during their pitstops and this caused their tyres to deflate. Taking an overall perspective on today’s results, however, we did have some new developments here and we have gained some useful data for the future. We have learnt from this race and once we have combined the information from all the Bridgestone drivers and all the car data, we hope to keep the improvements coming for the future grands prix.”

Full Bridgestone Race Report  Back to Top

Michelin

Pierre Dupasquier, Michelin motorsport director
“It’s difficult to see how we could have done much better. Two of our partners opted for different strategies and finished comfortably clear of the opposition. Fernando Alonso and Kimi Räikkönen set a fantastic pace throughout the race – and the result also underlines the extraordinary job Kimi did during qualifying, when he set third fastest time with enough fuel on board for 28 laps. This has been a fantastic demonstration of the combined excellence of Michelin and its partner teams – and I’d like to congratulate Renault on what, for them as well as us, is a home victory.”

Full Michelin Race Report  Back to Top

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