28-Apr: At the post Race press conference for the Spanish Grand Prix,
Michael Schumacher was very pleased with the consistency of the
Bridgestone tyres and the car's suitability to the track which made them look
so dominant and said "I wasn't 100 percent clear what it was going to be
in the race, whether we would fall a little bit during the race over the
distance which we have seen in the past several times. But then I have to say
that the tyres Bridgestone has developed have performed very well in
qualifying, which was lacking a little bit at the last race, but they kept
their consistency for the race and that's something obviously we are very
happy about. And then it's simply the right circuit for our car. The guys in
our team have done a tremendous job over the winter and again, this circuit
shows what our engineers have done."
Describing the Ferrari as phenomenal, he still warned that they will have
tougher competition at upcoming circuits and said "You have circuits
which really favour us and circuits which are very close. We have seen in
Austria, at the end of the stint, that the Michelin runners were very
competitive so if they get the consistency somehow. They can be very
competitive there this year. We know what happened last year in Canada so
there will be circuits which are much more difficult for us. But here, we know
that the Bridgestone tyre works very well, plus our car is simply phenomenal
and it shows up here. Aerodynamics, we had something last year which was very
good but our engineers really have managed to improve that and that's what you
can see very well.
We have seen here that we have been dominant but we have seen other races like
Brazil where it was a close fight and we have no idea what it's going to be
like in Austria."
As for the problems with Rubens Barrichello, he said "It's really bad
luck for Rubens. Everything that has gone wrong this year so far has gone
wrong for him. You can't really think it will always go that way. You know
that one day it's going to hit you. We will simply try our best not to let it
happen and again and I'm sorry for Rubens."
Juan Pablo Montoya was very pleased to have scored 6
points at this track and said "It was clearly a difficult race for us. I
think we made the best of what we had. In the pit stops I hit my crew chief.
Hopefully he's alright. Actually I've heard he's alright. Apart from that, the
race went pretty well. We struggled all weekend with pace. I've got to say
that I'm very pleased actually to get out of here with second place.
In testing we are not good here and coming out of here in second place is more
than we could expect really. I said at the beginning of the weekend if I could
get out of here with one or two points I would be more than happy. On Friday
we were 12th and 14th or something. Yesterday, luckily, on my last run I
managed to get a set-up on the car and, after the problems I had, I managed to
get the car up there on the grid. Today we knew there was nothing we could do
against the Ferrari. It was just way too quick"
Describing the incident he had with the lollipop man, he said "I think he
lifted it because he thought I could go. He tried to stop me with his body. I
managed to stop as fast as I could but I had already run over him. It wasn't
such a big issue. I managed to stop fairly quickly. As soon as he stood in
front of me I managed to stop the car. It was lucky I still had my hand on the
clutch and didn't stall so it worked quite well. As soon as I got out of the
car at the finish of the race they told me. It was okay."
Juan Pablo was right behind Ralf Schumacher when he went wide damaging his
car, he described what he saw and said "From my understanding, but I
don't know if something failed, I just saw him run wide on the blind
right-hander that goes onto the back straight. He missed the apex and when I
came to the top of the crest he was in the gravel."
David Coulthard indicated that he wouldn't have
dreamt of a podium finish unless some of the cars in front failed and said
"I think when we spoke on Friday I said that we didn't expect it to be an
easy circuit for us, and I knew that the only way I was going to get a podium
or dream of a podium was if other cars had reliability problems. I am happy to
have benefited from that and I had an interesting battle early on with Jenson.
And that was it. That was the only excitement in the race. I kept pushing up
until the last five laps and that was our race."
As for Raikkonen's rear wing failure and if it affect him, he said "They
didn't tell me anything. It was quite obvious what had happened. There's no
reason to pull the car out or for me to be worried about it because we haven't
had a wing failure this year at all. Obviously they will look at the remains
of what's actually there and try and understand exactly why it failed, whether
it was fatigue or whether it was manufacturing. But unfortunately those are
the stresses and strains that are on Grand Prix cars. Occasionally they
fail."
28-Apr: What the teams and
drivers said following the Race at Barcelona ... Report
28-Apr:
Spanish GP
– Race: Michael Schumacher wins the race ahead of Juan Pablo Montoya
and David Coulthard. Nick Heidfeld, Felipe Massa and Heinz Harald Frentzen
make the top 6 ... Timed
Results ... Report ... Notes
28-Apr:
Spanish GP
– Warm-up: Rubens Barrichello sets the fastest time of the
session ahead of Nick Heidfeld and Michael Schumacher. Felipe Massa, Heinz
Harald Frentzen and Ralf Schumacher make the top 6 ... Timed
Results ... Report ... Notes
Friday
Practice Session 1
Friday Practice Session 2
Saturday Practice Session 1
Saturday Practice Session 2 Qualifying Session
Warm-up Session Race
11
AM Barcelona Time / 9 AM GMT
1 PM Barcelona Time / 11 AM GMT
9 AM Barcelona Time / 7 AM GMT
10:15 AM Barcelona Time / 8:15 AM GMT 1 PM Barcelona Time / 11 AM GMT 9:30 AM Barcelona Time / 7:30 AM GMT 2 PM Barcelona Time / 12 PM GMT
