Saturday: Tire wear problems for Liuzzi and HRT
Daniel Ricciardo couldn't drive much today due to a problem with his engine, so he wasn't able to fully understand the track and its subtleties. On Vitantonio Liuzzi's side, things went a bit better, but the Italian driver complains of premature tire wear and expects a difficult race with many pit stops. The HRT team, which hoped to get closer to Virgin, in particular, will likely have more difficulty tomorrow in the race due to not being able to test everything they hoped for.
Vitantonio Liuzzi – 23rd and 23rd
Overall, I’m happy with the car’s balance and it was responding well. We had a good Saturday. In qualifying, we were a few tenths behind one of the Virgin cars and a bit more behind the second, so we need to understand the reasons for this gap. We lost some time in the third sector due to graining and it will be key tomorrow as the race will be tough. There are a lot of issues with the tires, especially the super softs, and we will have to make many pit stops. We just need to try to make them at the right time to get closer to our rivals.
Daniel Ricciardo – 24th and 24th
This morning, we had some issues that the guys tried to fix, and we managed to get out on track at the end of the session. But this afternoon, on my first timed lap, my engineer came on the radio to tell me to come in because he saw another problem through the data. I’m sure it will be resolved, and we will try to have a good race tomorrow. As far as today is concerned, as long as I can cover some kilometers, there’s nothing better.
Colin Kolles – Director of the HRT team
After yesterday’s wet sessions, there was not a second to lose today. We had a tight schedule for the third practice session and our two drivers immediately hit the track as soon as the light turned green. Tonio was able to complete his program on soft tires and did a few laps at the end with the super softs. Daniel had a coolant leak and had to come back in very early. The team worked very hard to fix the problem, and Daniel was finally able to do 11 laps before the end of the session. Everything seemed good for the qualifying session. Tonio pushed on two sets of super softs, but Daniel had to return to the garage after a drop in water pressure in the engine. Let’s hope everything will be fixed for tomorrow, but this lack of track time will not help us in beating our rivals.
