Mike GascoyneQ&A

"I think, to be honest, apart from the top three teams we could have raced anyone. But not from 17th and 18th [on the grid]! The cars were quick on Friday, and around 11th is where we'd hoped to qualify, but we had a shit Saturday. There have been improvements in the car since Magny-Cours, although we perhaps haven't shown it. The cars were pretty good and the tyres were obviously good. We had a terrible Saturday, and didn't do any laps in the morning, so we hampered ourselves. Again we had a standard warm-up, no laps because we're keeping engine miles down, but we do that for reliability and it paid off."



"The car is undoubtedly better in low downforce trim aerodynamically, so we did expect it to be a little better. At Hockenheim you've only got low speed chicanes, and the stadium is very low speed, and straights. At Monza you've got high speed corners thrown in there as well, which tends not be so good for us. But we also did our first two-car test where we did more miles than we'd done in any test this year. In Monza we made quite a lot of progress. Hockenheim was probably the first race that we were actually properly prepared for, and we had a good weekend. Maybe it was co-incidence, and maybe we got lucky, but maybe not."



"The engines have been better since Magny-Cours, and we were able to take enough wing off. The car has always been good mechanically, as in Monaco. So we could take probably more wing off than other people, and still survive in the stadium, because the mechanical grip has been good. The car mechanically is very, very good, and it's always been good under braking, so you set the wing levels to make sure you're competitive on top speed."



"I think I lost count actually! No, we lost both qualifying engines on Saturday morning, so it was difficult. But they have been targeting the race engines with their best bits. They struggle with production, they don't have a lot of the latest bits, and they target them at races. So our best engines are always going into races. The engines that we have on Saturday are always of a lesser spec - not power-wise but reliability-wise."



"I think it's not necessarily by Renault, it's by their suppliers. There are a lot of reasons. You can blame them and people have been, but they got two cars to the finish. A lot of people that aren't in those problems didn't get engines to the finish. So maybe it's not a very good showing by them either."



"Yes. We started on the first start with new tyres, and on the second start, and both starts were fantastic. We've only just introduced our launch control at the last race, but we did so when it was ready and we thought it was good, and I think our starts were as strong as anyone's."



"Enough to finish fourth and fifth! I think Renault know how much work they've got to do, just as we know how much work we've got to do with the aerodynamics. It's all about hard work. We've been behind, which is why at the start of the year we said we're behind, don't expect too much."



"We thought our best chance to get points in the second half of the season was Hungary. We've got a load of new aero bits for Hungary which will address a lot of the high speed corner problems that we've had. We said it would get better in the second half of the year, and hopefully it is doing. Michelin are strong and that obviously helps us as well."