Michelin: Wear Due to Bad Management

That is the view of Michelin's motorsport boss Pierre Dupasquier, who believes that Renault duo Fernando Alonso and Giancarlo Fisichella pushing too hard in the early stages of the race, plus the extra stress the tyres were put through by the two cars being filled up with fuel early in the race, were the key factors in contributing to the team's problems.

"It is something that has to do with the basic laws of physics," said Dupasquier. "If you have more weight there's more energy around under braking and accelerating. You have to get the tyre management right and they didn't do a very good tyre management.

"They've done much better tyre management in other situations, like in Imola. But we are responsible too, because we made the choice together. Anyway, after what we have achieved at the start of the season let's not dramatise things too much."

Dupasquier is also adamant that Renault's decision to opt for the harder compound Michelin rubber did not have a major impact in the eventual problems - and the team would probably have suffered similarly if they had treated soft tyres the same.

"The most important thing is to decide the good strategy beforehand," said Dupasquier. "Would choosing a softer tyre, that would spin less, be the answer? No, it wouldn't.

"You have 900bhp going into the wheels, but the amount of tyre spin is decided by the traction control. If you put softer tyres on with the same traction control settings, you don't gain in grip, because you have too much adhesion, already.

"We should have done a better preparation together, but let me be clear. If their drivers had lapped in 1m16.8s to 1m17.2s during the first part of the race instead of pushing harder, they would have finished the race with no problems at all. A better management of the tyres in the first part of the race would have certainly helped them."

When asked whether he believed the drivers should take some blame for pushing too hard in the early stages, Dupasquier had nothing but praise for the job Alonso and Fisichella did.

"Alonso did a brilliant job with the car he was given," he explained. "And even Fisichella did a great job with the shit car at the end of the race. To control the cars with the lack of grip they had was certainly not easy."