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Friday, 12 October 2012
Kimi Räikkönen evaluated the team’s new Coandă
exhaust system whilst Romain Grosjean ran
through the usual programme of general setup
work during the first day of running here at the
Korea International Circuit. Both drivers made
their inaugural appearance on Korean soil,
running reliably through the two 90 minute
practice sessions.
Alan Permane, Trackside Operations Director -
Technical programme notes
We ran the Coandă exhaust system on Kimi’s car
for both sessions.
Romain ran with the Singapore generation rear
wing for evaluation at the start of FP1,
swapping to the Japan spec rear wing for the
remainder of the day.
Pirelli’s soft compound tyre was used in the
morning, the soft and super soft in the
afternoon.
What we learned today :
The Coandă exhaust performed as expected
aerodynamically.
Heavy fuel balance and tyre degradation levels
were both promising.
Kimi Räikkönen, E20-05
Free practice 1 : P11, 1:40.929, 14 laps
Free practice 2 : P10, 1:39.839, 26 laps
Kimi :
“The circuit is okay ; it’s surprisingly bumpy
in some parts but it’s quite different from
other places we race. It’s difficult for me to
say about the exhaust until I’ve sat down with
the engineers and gone through the data. We’ll
try to improve the car for tomorrow as it wasn’t
very easy to drive and get a good lap today.
Let’s see if we can get it completely right and
maybe we can be in the top five in qualifying.”
Romain Grosjean, E20-03
Free practice 1 : P8, 1:40.422, 22 laps
Free practice 2 : P11, 1:39.957, 28 laps
Romain :
“It’s not been the easiest day. I think we still
have some work to do with the car to get the
best out of the tyres so tomorrow morning will
be important. The track is interesting but it’s
not been so hard to learn. The trickiest part is
definitely Turns 11 & 12 which are not easy to
get exactly right but overall it’s not too bad.
On the positive side we’ve had a good amount of
time learning the circuit and gathered a lot of
data, so hopefully we can analyse things
overnight and see an improved performance by the
time we get to qualifying.”
Alan Permane, Trackside Operations Director :
“We’re happy with how the new exhaust worked
from a performance perspective and now need to
assess if there are any potential reliability
implications due to the hot exhaust gas running
in different areas than usual. Early impressions
are certainly good and we expect to retain it
for the rest of the weekend with Kimi. Both
drivers learnt the circuit very quickly. Romain
complained of a little too much oversteer and
with Kimi there’s still potential with the setup,
especially as we learn more about the new
exhaust. Both drivers reported that they were
very happy with the balance of the car when on
high fuel loads and degradation levels look
manageable from the tyres so it’s been a
productive first day.”
Saturday, 13 October 2012
A closely fought qualifying session at the Korea
International Circuit saw Kimi Räikkönen clinch
fifth position whilst using the team's new Coand
exhaust system, while team-mate Romain Grosjean
with start in seventh place on the grid for
tomorrow's Korean Grand Prix.
Kimi Räikkönen, E20-05. Q : P5, 1:37.625. FP3
: P5, 1:38.666
"Qualifying was okay and I think we did the best
we could have done. We tried some different
things on the car over the weekend and qualified
in a reasonably good position, but of course you
always want to go faster. The new exhaust system
feels good ; you do lose a little horsepower
from it but it's better on the aero side and you
can't get something for nothing. The gap to the
cars at the front is not too much so we'll try
to do what we can
tomorrow."
Romain Grosjean, E20-03. Q : P7, 1:37.934.
FP3 : P4 1:38.582
"It was a bit of a strange qualifying session
for me to be honest ; In Q1 the car felt nowhere,
in Q2 it was good, then in Q3 it wasn't
fantastic either so we need to spend some time
analysing what happened. The track changed a
little and the tyres felt slightly different so
we need to understand that. For sure there will
be a lot of attention on my start tomorrow ;
know my objectives and I think we're capable of
a good result."
Alan Permane, Trackside Operations Director :
"It looks like our new package is working as it
should."
How do you assess today's qualifying
performance ?
"We're reasonably happy with today's performance
and it looks like our new package is working as
it should. We've clearly taken a step forward
and getting both cars solidly into Q3 is
satisfying."
How did the new Coand exhaust system work ?
"We have made clear performance gains and
there's still further improvement to come from
it once we have optimised the set-up. Kimi had
great pace in Q1 to go through with a single run
on the soft tyre whereas Romain needed a set of
the super softs to be sure of getting into Q2,
but from then on we were confident of getting
both cars into Q3. The advantage from the new
Coand exhaust system on Kimi's car confirms that
we will run it on both for the next race."
How do the different tyre compounds perform
here ?
"After some difficulties with front tyre
graining yesterday we now have both the soft and
super soft compounds working well. We've seen
track improvement and have also found a better
set-up to make improvements in this area.
Pirelli say one stop is possible, which is
something we'll have a good close look at."
Sunday, 14 October 2012
Kimi Räikkönen took fifth while Romain Grosjean
finished seventh in a fast-paced and intense
Korean Grand Prix today. Kimi maintains third
position in the Drivers’ Championship on 167
points ; 42 from Fernando Alonso ahead and with
an increased 14 point buffer to Lewis Hamilton
behind. The team remains fourth in the
Constructors’ Championship on 255 points ; 29
behind McLaren and 119 in front of Mercedes.
•Both drivers started on Pirelli’s super soft
compound tyres.
•Kimi pitted for his first set of soft rubber on
lap 14, his second on lap 35.
•Romain stopped for his first set of softs on
lap 13, his second on lap 31.
Kimi Räikkönen, P5, E20-05
"I think this was about where we should have
been today. The yellow flags at the start didn’t
help when we were fighting with Felipe [Massa]
but even so we didn’t quite have the speed to
match the Red Bulls and Ferraris. We also lost
quite a bit of time behind Lewis [Hamilton] –
mainly because the new exhaust system means you
lose a little bit of power so it was hard to get
past – but with a few more practice sessions I’m
sure we’ll learn a lot more to be able to
improve it. I was pretty much on my own at the
end but we had to keep pushing to maintain
position and it wasn’t so easy. The gap to
Sebastian [Vettel] in the Championship is quite
big now so it will be very difficult to catch
him, but we’ll keep pushing all the way.”
Romain Grosjean, P7, E20-03
“For sure I was a bit nervous starting the race
today, but we did a lot of work this week trying
to understand a few things and it’s certainly
helped. It wasn’t the easiest start ; there was
contact behind me at turn three and I took
evasive action but after that it was quite
straight forward. I struggled on the last set of
tyres as I had graining straight away meaning
the performance was not great during the final
stint. Maybe we could have achieved one place
better – I think I now know every detail of
Force India’s car after spending so much time
battling with Nico [Hulkenberg] – but I’m happy
to make it to the chequered flag after a good,
clean race.”
Eric Boullier, Team Principal
"We knew we would not be fighting for the win
here, and fifth for Kimi was the maximum we
could have achieved today. We scored a good
tally of points in the Constructors’
Championship and although third position is
slowly edging away from us with just four races
left now we’re not ready to give up. It was good
to see Romain drive very sensibly despite all
the pressure that is on his shoulders ; I think
he is learning from this experience and it will
only make him a stronger driver. Kimi’s
racecraft was impressive as usual ; his battle
with Lewis [Hamilton] showed real class and he
was maybe unlucky not to have been closer to the
leading pack after being held up for so long. We
will have the Coandă exhausts on both cars in
India which should help us in our fight.”
James Allison, Technical Director
“We’ve finished in our starting positions which
is solid if ultimately unspectacular. In the
first stint Kimi was able to live with the pace
of the front runners and had it not been for a
costly period spent tucked up behind Lewis
[Hamilton] I think he could probably have stayed
in touch with the leading group. We were also
pleased with Romain’s performance ; he achieved
what we had asked of him by keeping his nose
clean and bringing the car home to score
valuable points for the team. We didn’t exactly
set the world on fire today, but we can take
some comfort from the fact we were more on the
pace here than we have been since Hungary.”
Ricardo Penteado, Renault Sport F1 Team
Support Leader
“A good double points finish today to keep the
momentum in the championship. We used the Suzuka
engines on both cars this weekend and worked
with the chassis team to optimise the Coandă
exhaust system on Kimi’s car. We have made solid
progress in this area and with two weeks between
now and the next event we will be able to
further optimise the engine torque maps to be
closer to the podium in India.” |
