Ferrari Welcome Points Finish

Michael Schumacher had looked set for a strong run before being taken out of the race by Takuma Sato, while Rubens Barrichello overcame poor pace at the start to take fifth place.

"It was a day when some opportunities presented themselves, but we did not take all of those that came our way," said Brawn. "At the beginning of the race we held our positions but we were not that strong.

"Then, we thought we would take a chance and try dry tyres on Michael's car when the Safety Car came out, but he realised there was no way he could drive on them.

"The laptimes seemed to indicate that 'dries' would work, but for some reason they did not and we had to change back immediately. Then, to finish it off, came the accident with Sato. Rubens struggled at the beginning of the race, then the car got better.

"But towards the end we tried to stay on the wet tyres, but they got too hot and changing to dries cost us a position. The only good thing is we have slightly increased our lead over Toyota."

Barrichello believed that Ferrari had simply not been fast enough to make the most of the weather conditions - which should have played to the strengths of their Bridgestone tyres.

"Unfortunately  we  did  not  have  enough  speed  today  and  that  was  a  problem throughout the race," explained the Brazilian. "The decisions we made regarding tyre choice were good, as were the decisions about when to make the pit stops. That is the only reason why we managed to bring home some points.

"At  one  point  we  felt  it  was  better  to  stay  on  the  rain  tyres  as  although  they  were  getting  slick  they seemed to be working better. Unfortunately, after this stage had passed, the tyres went off quite a bit and I had to stop to change them.

"Then I lost fourth position because getting the dry tyres warm at the end was very difficult and Webber overtook me very easily. Considering everything that happened today, coming home with four points is not bad."