Tyre Quotes

`Isn`t it fun getting older` is really a terrible fallacy. That`s like saying I prefer driving an old car with a flat tyre.

It`s a real pity we lost all that time in the morning: it was just a stupid thing where we slid a bit wide. I was quite surprised that the whole tyre came off the rim. I actually quite enjoy these vineyard roads; when it is going well I can get into quite a good rhythm with the car. Tomorrow we have the opportunity to make up some places, so we`ve got to attack -- even though I don`t really like the Baumholder stages.

This was quite a straightforward rally for me. I lost time on the first day when a tyre came off the rim, but by the end of it I was back to fourth again and from then on it was just a question of holding that position. I had a bit of excitement today when the Ford of Daniel Sola held me up in the morning and I had to overtake him, but apart from that we had no dramas. It was a good, solid performance from ourselves and the team.

That was a pretty tough race for us today. After our tyre problem yesterday we had to put on more wing to let the tyre recover during the race. But the car was very difficult to drive all race, especially early on. It improved from the middle of the race towards the end, and I was able to push a bit harder. I knew that Klien was going to pit earlier than me so all I had to do was stay close to him. Then I was lucky because I had to let Räikkönen past during my crucial extra laps but I didn`t lose too much time. After all that, one point is better than nothing.

Unfortunately weather like that means that this will be a hard weekend for all the teams. Obviously it makes it very difficult to pick which dry tyre to run ? if we ever get a chance to run on dries this weekend. It makes tomorrow busier, too. We`ll have to go out in the wet eventually. There have been no wet races yet this year and at Toyota we haven`t done much testing in the wet either. So we`ll have to wait and see how it works out.

We face the biggest risk here of any circuit we race on. The danger isn`t so much hitting the tyre barriers as hitting another car that has already spun. Visibility is already an issue and that adds to the risk. The spray does not clear. The trees hold the moisture. You cannot see a thing in the spray.

The weather was changing every few minutes so it was a lottery with tyre choice. Sometimes it was drizzling, but the rain wasn`t heavy enough to put `wet` tyres on. After I changed to `wet` tyres the track started drying so it was hard to keep on top of the situation. My team made some good calls to improve our track position. I ended up doing a double stint, and physically it wasn`t a problem. You just had to drive to the conditions. The day started out badly with the engine failure in the warm-up. The crew did a great job getting the engine changed in time for the race. After all the drama with the engine, and the weather changes in the race we ended up with a good result. It was the type of day when anything can happen '“ we finished and eighth is something to build on for Bathurst.

Dani made very good step-by-step progress. He tried a qualifying tyre for the first time and he was very good, we are pleased. He also did a longer session and was consistently fast, so we are happy with this too.

(The tropically hot conditions that prevail at Sepang make life tough for tyres, but Michelin has always been up to the track`s demands.) Sepang is one of those special places where you get a lot more wheelspin than normal, ... The hotter it is, the more wheelspin you get, so you just try to keep the bike in line, you have to think about conserving your tyres more. The place is very heavy on the right side of the tyres, that`s the side that gets all the abuse, so Michelin takes all that into account and builds something focusing 90 per cent on of the right side of the tyre. The places that really generate heat are turns three, six and coming onto the back straight (turn 14) where the thing just wants to light up.