Patrick Head Q&A

"From that point of view it's good. One can look at today with mixed views. If you start second and fourth on the grid to finish third and fourth is certainly not progress. Equally we were eighth and 18th at the end of the first lap, so third and fourth after being eighth and 18th at Budapest is really not too bad! Clearly the car was quite quick, and it's just a pity that Ralf didn't have the opportunity to show whether he could have mixed it to Alonso. All credit to Alonso. He drove a fantastic race and clearly was very quick, but Ralf probably could have made him earn it a bit more."



"I'm sure that was one thing that didn't help, but ultimately you have to be able to start on all sorts of track surfaces, and that was just one of them."



"Something like that. Apparently there was too much activity from the clutch and traction control."



"That was the thing. We went into the first corner fourth and sixth, and ended the first lap eighth and 18th, so somehow they didn't make the best of it."



"It was just that Michael was alongside, and Carl [Gaden], the chief mechanic, kept the lollipop down as Ralf was trying to go. It was just the unfortunate positioning of Michael in the pitlane. Sam [Michael] said that Carl was quite right to have kept the lollipop down."



"The brake wear was a little bit on the high side, but nothing serious."



"Oh yes. Including passing his brother as well."



"The moment Webber came in, Kimi was free to go, and Juan was stuck behind someone at that time, and that's where the gap was made."



"It's his third when you consider Australia and Montreal and that one."



"No, but it could have done."



"Well, he's the guy that loses by it, so we'll probably mention to him that he wasn't the best thing in the world. I see he's out there at the moment saying, 'I don't know what happened, the car just got away from me!'"



"No, we thought we had every chance of competing at the front here. It's a disappointing result to have Kimi finishing ahead of us, and we've lost a point to McLaren in the constructors,' or they've closed up one on us. But we've now got eight on Ferrari."



"We're two races away from Silverstone, a race that Ferrari won and were clearly very strong at, and Silverstone has some similarities to Suzuka, certainly. We are aware that we have got to make some improvements if we're going to compete directly with Ferrari at Suzuka."



"It's a bit mixed. If the weather conditions go towards Bridgestone's intermediates, then Michelin don't have anything that can compete with it. The window for the wet tyre is probably narrower than that for the Bridgestone, but in the right conditions it's a very good wet tyre."



"Basically the situation is quite simple. It will only occur once Ralf is not in a position to challenge. He's 14 points behind Michael. Theoretically there are 30 points on the table, and say there was a big coming together among the top three, he could still be in there."