Sunday: Heatwave for HRT
HRT was not able to confirm, at home, the strong performances they had achieved in recent races, due to rear axle overheating.
Vitantonio Liuzzi – 23rd
« It was a really tough race for us because we were struggling with the rear end. We knew from Friday that it would be difficult because the rear was overheating, and that’s why we had to make three stops and, unfortunately, we couldn’t keep up with the Virgins. In the first two stints, we were battling with them, but then, because we stopped one more time, we could no longer fight with them.
We must fight hard if we want to keep up with our rivals, we need to improve and work hard, day and night. It’s a shame because we were in front of our home crowd. They have been fantastic with us, but we must keep attacking for the rest of the season.
Narain Karthikeyan – 24th
As expected, the car was rather difficult to drive in the race because of the heat: the rear tires degraded a lot and we had the same brake problems all weekend. At the beginning, I tried to stay in contact with Liuzzi and D’Ambrosio, but after that, I had a solitary race. I finished the race but can’t take much positive from it. Obviously, our performance wasn’t the best but the crowd was great and we hoped to do better here.
Colin Kolles, Team Principal
We struggled all weekend with the tires, especially with the rear set. We had to make three stops because the tire degradation was too significant while our main rivals were on a two-stop strategy. The pace was generally good, but because of these additional stops, we couldn’t gain positions. We need to work hard, particularly on the aerodynamic front and on the rear of the car, to achieve our championship goals.
