The Hindu : Sport : We are having a bad phase

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, May 29, 2005

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We are having a bad phase

The real battle will be between Mclaren and Renault

NARAIN KARTHIKEYAN

There are times in Formula One when there is only a weeks gap between two races and this is one such incident. I had a poor performance in Monaco last weekend, which saw me retire very early in the race. Actually, for that race, the problems started as early as the practice session on Thursday when I hit the barrier. The Monaco circuit is very unforgiving and even the slightest mistake can put you out of the race.

Due to that mistake, I lost a lot of time and had to play catch up all weekend. Also, on the opening lap I had a coming together with Ralf Schumacher and that didn't help the cause much. The tires and the car were a real handful on the Monaco circuit and it made driving really tough. I was facing a lot of problems with the car and we had to eventually call it a day very early in the race.

The Nurburgring Circuit is another circuit where I have never raced before and is totally new to me. However, one good thing about this track is that it is pretty straightforward and is easy to get a hang of. At the practice session on Friday, I hit a cone and damaged my car slightly, which saw me do only seven laps where as some of the other drivers managed 30 laps of practice. We are going through a bad phase and we need to get out of it as fast as possible. We have made some changes in the car and hopefully it might change our fortunes.

The qualifying process has changed and now we will only have one qualifying round on Saturday, which will determine the grid position. It will be harder, because we will now be qualifying with the race level fuel which makes the car about 90 kilograms heavier which is about 20 per cent of the car weight. Since the Formula One cars are very light, a change in fuel load changes the entire handling of the car.

The BAR Hondas will make their return in this race and though they missed the last couple of races, they have been practicing and we can expect them to deliver a strong performance. The real battle will of course be between the Mclarens and the Renaults. They are again looking strong for the race today.

We will be launching our new car before the French Grand Prix and with that car we can hopefully expect to challenge the Saubers and Red Bull Racing team. For the time being though, we are hoping to give a strong performance at Nurburgring and are aiming to complete the race.

TCM

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