Bourdais upbeat despite heartbreak

The four-time Champ Car champion started from the back of the grid, but a solid drive and good pitstop calls elevated him to fourth place with just a couple of laps remaining.

The Frenchman had to defend his position against Fernando Alonso and Heikki Kovalainen but looked set to finish in fourth until he suffered a mechanical problem with just two laps to go.

Bourdais, who still got two points following the disqualification of Rubens Barrichello, was happy with how his debut had panned out, although the admitted he was sorry to miss out on a great result.

"It's not the first time I've experienced disappointment in racing and it won't be the last," said Bourdais, "but what is important is that the team has worked really well, reacting very quickly, getting me into pitlane as soon as the lights went off for the second safety car. It was a great call.

"From then on I was good to go in terms of fuel and others ahead still had to stop. It was very tough as I was under a lot of pressure from behind, first from a BMW and then it was Fernando and Kovalainen. At one stage, I decided to back off a bit, but I found I was making a few mistakes, so I pushed harder and pulled out a bit of a gap.

"I hardly dared look at the pit board, but I knew it was nearly the end of the race. At the start I was down the order and running quite heavy and I was struggling a bit. But then I got the hang of things and after the re-start my radio did not work for a moment, so I was caught out by the green light.

"But to come from almost last to fourth was an excellent start. I hope we get two points and in a first grand prix, that's not too bad."

Teammate Sebastian Vettel went out of the race after making contact with Giancarlo Fisichella at the first corner.

"My problems began at the start when I stalled," he said. "There was nothing I could do about it as that problem was not actually my fault. That meant I dropped down the order and going into the first corner I had Kimi on the left and Jenson on the right.

"I tried to stay as close as possible to Kimi to give enough room to the car on the right. Then, as I turned into the corner, I felt that I had been hit on my rear right side. That spun me round and I was in the middle of a collision. Very disappointing."