Confirmation - Chevrier

The Head of Engine Track Operations, Denis Chevrier, talks about his weekend and the Melbourne result. Giancarlo Fisichella finished 5th, while team mate Heikki Kovalainen finished 10th during his GP debut.

“Yes and no. It’s obvious that we can’t be satisfied with a haul of four points at the end of a grand prix, but you can’t fall into the depths of despair either after one race. I think that today’s hierarchy confirms what we saw in private testing. The Ferraris are the quickest, followed by the McLarens. Then Renault and BMW seem to be on about the same level but we were not the strongest in today’s duel.”

“You’re right. It’s not just a question of simply looking at the classification, but the gaps as well. Today we were around a second a lap off the pace. It’s huge, especially as we didn’t run into any special problems. We did not have the wrong strategy or meet with problems during pit stops, for example. It’s difficult to attribute this lack of performance to any one parameter in particular; it would be too simple but one thing that’s clear is that we’re not yet getting the best out of the tyres. We’ll have to sort through the data collected this weekend, find some explanations, and then improve the interaction between the chassis-engine-tyre package.”

“That’s a good question! This circuit is very different and it emphasizes different dynamic qualities of the cars, in particular with the long quick corners. So the hierarchy may evolve. In addition, we’ll have completed three days’ testing on the track before tackling the grand prix. So we’ll have more reference points.”