Toro Rosso failed to turn their top-ten grid slots into points in China and in fact finished just ahead of the three backmarker teams...
Toro Rosso:
Sebastien Buemi: "Not the result we were expecting so I am a bit disappointed and frustrated that I failed to score points, having started from a points position. I don't really know what happened at the start, as I had a poor start even though from my point of view I think I did everything right, so I would like to see the data, because I had a lot of wheelspin. After that, I got passed by Heidfeld and then, at a certain point, I started to feel a lot of understeer, to the point where it was getting very difficult to drive the car, so we decided to change the front wing. That meant an extra pit stop and from then on my race was compromised. We could have done a lot better without that, but this is how it ended and all we can do now is see how we can make a step forward for Turkey."
Jaime Alguersuari: "From quite early on I was struggling with grip from the rear tyres, so we decided to come in earlier than planned for the first stop to try and fight back for the ground lost at the start. Then, immediately after leaving the pits, I felt the car was very unstable and then I lost a wheel nut and the wheel came off, so there was nothing I could do. After my best qualifying position I was hoping for better even if we knew we would be using quite worn tyres after qualifying, so we had started on my worst set of tyres to try and have an edge later in the race, but it was not to be."
Team Lotus:
Heikki Kovalainen: "That is our best ever performance. It's not the highest place we've had but today we beat two midfield cars in a straight fight so I am very happy, with my performance and the performance of the whole team. We knew we would struggle in the cool conditions yesterday but today the temperatures rose and we expected to be able to put in the sort of race that would do justice to the pace that is in the car. We will keep working hard to improve the car's behaviour in the cooler conditions and we can only get better from here."
Jarno Trulli: "I had a good start and then Heikki and I were able to pull away from the cars behind and keep to the strategy to fight with the guys ahead. My first stop wasn't great and I'm still having a few issues with the tyre degradation but really today is about the team result. We have shown we are developing exactly as we want to and that's a huge motivation for everyone."
Virgin:
Jerome D'Ambrosio: "I'm very pleased with my race. It's my second finish so I'm happy about that. I think I made progress throughout the whole weekend and my race pace was much better than in the previous two races, which is also good. The first lap was good fun as I had an enjoyable fight with Timo, he got past me, then I passed him and then he overtook me again. It was the sort of racing I like. I can see I'm making improvements and that's the important thing and now I'm looking forward to Turkey."
Timo Glock: "Not a great race unfortunately from my point of view, but positive in the fact that we got both cars home, which was the objective. I had a good start and a good first lap. I managed to stay in front of the HRT and overtook Jérôme when he had a moment in turn 13. In general we suffered a bit more rear degradation for some reason. The team then took the decision to convert to a three stop race but this was not the right way to go because we suffered massively with the blue flags. Then in the last stop the wheel didn't go on, which cost me a few seconds leaving the pits. Generally on the hard tyre the car was slightly better but in the beginning we just struggled. A difficult start to the season is now behind us and we look forward positively to the upgrade that everyone has been working so hard on behind the scenes to ensure we can take a good step forward in Turkey. Thanks to everyone in the team for a great start operationally and I hope we can share some better results as we move ahead."
Hispania:
Tonio Liuzzi: "We have performed a lot better than in Malaysia and have closed the gap on Virgin, our closest rival. Unfortunately I had a drive-through penalty because of a problem at the start where I dropped the clutch too early and moved before the green light. But overall I'm happy because we achieved our target which was to reach the checkered flag. Now we have to look forward to Turkey because our race pace has improved from Malaysia and will be even better in Turkey with the updates."
Narain Karthikeyan: "We met our main objective today which was none other than to finish the race. I don't think the Virgin's are that far ahead of us which is good for future races. After having completed our target today we now have to improve the car and try and attack from Turkey onwards. With the new updates and parts we will be a lot more competitive for the next race. Nothing is easy in Formula 1 but we can definitely compete with our closest rivals soon."
