Monteiro Unhappy despite Race Finish

The Portuguese finished his 15th Grand Prix in succession to continue with his perfect record in 2005, having been the only driver to cross under the chequered flag in every event.

Monteiro, however, was left disappointed after a crash at the start of the race damaged his revised Jordan EJ15B, making the handling difficult to predict.

In the end, he finished in 17th place.

"We finished another race which is good for the reliability of the new car but I am really disappointed as this was a really tough race right from the start," said Monteiro. "I lost some part of my bodywork so the balance of the car was affected and then the tyres got worse and worse.

"This was a big surprise to us as we were quite happy with them at the test last week and at the beginning of this weekend. I do not understand how the tyres could act like this. I am not happy with this race at all as the car was very difficult to drive at such a high speed circuit."

Teammate Narain Karthikeyan was also involved in an incident at the start, the Indian slamming Minardi driver Christijan Albers and blaming him for damaging his car.

"I made a good start but unfortunately Albers stupidly hit me in the rear at the first corner, which punctured my left rear tyre," Karthikeyan, 20th today, said. "It is really a pity as he has already done this to Tiago in the past. This is a long lap here so it took me a long time to come back to the pits to change tyre.

"Because I damaged my tyres in my accident yesterday, I had to use a very old set and therefore I knew this was the end of my race. However, I am still happy that I managed to finish the race and I hope we will have a better result at Spa with the new car."