Kiesa relief at debut finish
Minardi debutant Nicolas Kiesa survived the extreme heat at Hockenheim to record his first grand prix finish, placing 12th in yesterday's German GP, having had just 300km-worth of testing at Fiorano last week
The Dane, who stepped up from the Super Nova Formula 3000 team when former Minardi ace Justin Wilson was signed to the Jaguar squad for the rest of this season, had a trouble-free run at Hockenheim having managed to get within two tenths of team-mate Jos Verstappen's pace during practice and qualifying.
"For quite a lot of the race I was out there on my own," said Kiesa, "with no other cars around and that can be quite hard. You haven't got anyone to judge your pace against, and you find yourself pushing a bit harder and a bit harder, to the point where it would be easy to lose concentration and make a mistake.
"It was definitely a hard race, but I'm relieved to have my first grand prix behind me. I now know what to expect, which will definitely help me in the future."
Be part of the Autosport community
Join the conversationShare Or Save This Story
Brake issues hindered Rosenqvist’s chances of IndyCar victory in Long Beach
Ayrton Senna's famous Honda NSX up for sale
Yamaha to test completely new MotoGP bike at Jerez
Krack: Aston Martin frustrated by inconsistent F1 penalty decisions
How Stroll and Magnussen revealed the scale of F1’s racing and rules problems
Did F1's new sprint format work?
Chinese Grand Prix Driver Ratings 2024
Why Verstappen's China F1 win was a sideshow to the real battle
Subscribe and access Autosport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
Top Comments