Symonds Angered by Trulli's Error

Renault engineering chief Pat Symonds was shocked by the last-lap mistake that saw Italian driver Jarno Trulli hand a podium finish to Ferrari rival Rubens Barrichello in Sunday's French Grand Prix.

Trulli looked certain to follow Spanish teammate Fernando Alonso home to secure the final two podium places behind World Champion Michael Schumacher's Ferrari before his last-minute slip dropped him down to fourth.

"I simply can't understand something like that," said Symonds. "It looked like he left the door completely open. Unbelievable! I shall be talking to him to see what the problem was."

Ferrari's technical director Ross Brawn understandably had the opposite emotions and praised Barrichello for hounding Trulli into a mistake after a strong race that saw him fight through from tenth on the grid.

"I said to him four or five laps from the end 'it would look really sweet to have you on the rostrum today Rubens'," said Brawn. "That is what he did and that was fantastic!"

It was a good day all round for Ferrari as a mid-race call for a different strategy from Brawn, based on a suggestion from team race strategist Luca Baldisserri, saw Schumacher overhaul Alonso for victory.

But when asked if Renault had had eyes for victory, Symonds admitted: "No, absolutely not. We could see in our pre-race simulations that our only chance of beating them today was if they got held up in the first stint.

"They didn't, we quickly worked out they were on the four stop when we did our fuel times at the pit stops. We needed 17 seconds on them at the last stop and I knew we weren't going to get that. But it was good, a good race."