HRT enjoys fight with Marussia cars
HRT Formula 1 Team accomplished its goals as it managed to get both cars to the finish at the German GP. While Pedro De La Rosa managed to finish ahead of Timo Glock's Marussia, Narain Karthikeyan finished just behind in 23rd position.
Pedro de la Rosa fought with Timo Glock from the first lap and, on two occasions, the blue flags impeded him from overtaking the German driver. But with three laps to go, the Spanish driver’s perseverance was rewarded as he overtook Glock to finish in 21st position. Just like his teammate, Narain Karthikeyan showed good pace from start to finish but was unable to finish ahead of Glock by only three tenths, crossing the line in 23rd place. The good job done by the team in the garage, both in the strategy and in the four pit stops, also contributed to this result.
With no time to lose, the team heads this very night to Budapest, where the Hungarian Grand Prix will take place next week.
Pedro de la Rosa, F112-02, #22, 21st:
"I had a lot of fun in today’s race. Everything went well, we maintained a good rhythm and the tyres held out without any problems, but above all I’m happy about the fight I put up on the track. I was hunting down Glock’s car from start to finish and right at the end, when I saw that his tyres had nothing left in them, I overtook him in a place he didn’t expect. I’m very happy because, for the first time, we were able to beat a Marussia and overtake it on the track. The race wasn’t easy because I started to see blue flags very early on. It’s a big let down because once you see the first one you know many come behind. From then on you try to get out of the way, maintain your pace and not get your tyres dirty. And I think we achieved it. I hope we maintain this level and even improve on it in Hungary”.
Narain Karthikeyan, F112-03, #23, 23rd:
"It was a good race for us because we battled with our immediate competition from the first to the last lap. In this sense I think it was our best race of the season so far. I lost too much time with the blue flags in my last stint, but I didn’t finish far off Pedro or Glock. Our pace and rhythm was good and the best thing about it is that we achieved this with no upgrades on the car, so we’ve definitely got good potential”.
Luis Pérez-Sala, Team Principal:
"Today we took another small step forward and that’s always satisfying. We weren’t able to run as we would have liked on Friday or Saturday but today both Pedro and Narain completed a very good race. The pace of both drivers was very good and consistent, and they fought throughout the entire race, which was a square off between Pedro, Narain and Glock. In the end, Pedro managed to overtake Timo and Narain was just about to do so but just came up short. We can say that we’re very happy with the outcome and we hope to continue in this line at the Hungaroring next week”.
Race: 67 laps – Track distance: 4.574 km
