Sepang, April 05: Force India`s experiment with extreme
wet tyres fell flat on its face with Adrian Sutil finishing
17th and Giancarlo Fisichella 18th in the rain-ruined
Malaysian Grand Prix here on Sunday.
Torrential rain, lightening storms, a curtailed race and
the first half-points finish since the 1991 Australian Grand
Prix marked the Malaysian GP with Force India finding itself
at the receiving end of the precipitation.
Once the race got underway under ominously cloudy skies,
the Silverstone-based outfit anticipated heavy rain and both
Fisichella and Sutil pitted early for extreme wet tyres.
The downpour, however, did not materialise for a further
30 minutes and Fisichella soon aquaplaned off the circuit when
returning to the pits for another set of wets.
Sutil did change tyres but was in the pits when the race
was suspended and drivers were classified after 31 laps.
"When the rain started it was very difficult and just
about impossible to drive. We were in second or first gear at
20kph and even then we were sliding around the circuit. It was
unbelievable, so it was a good decision to stop the race,"
Sutil later said.
"It was a bit of a shame that it couldn`t be restarted as
I think we would have had a good chance in the wet conditions.
In the end though it was too dark to restart," he said.
Fisichella had no doubt that the decision to change to
extreme wet tyres so early boomeranged.
"Unfortunately we made a wrong call to change to extreme
wets very early on. We came in too early and I did three or
four laps under dry conditions so we destroyed the tyre," he
rued.
"Then it was raining and the grip was getting better and
better but there was just so much water and the tyres were
almost slicks so I could not control the car, it was just
aquaplaning," he said.
"It was not a good race for us, unfortunately we had a
wrong strategy but we will see for the next race," added the
Italian.
Chairman and team principal Vijay Mallya said conditions
were "almost unprecedented" and the team took gamble with the
tyres.
"We took a risk with the strategy. Unfortunately the rain
we expected - which you can normally bank on coming - didn`t
come soon enough and Giancarlo was unfortunate enough to be
returning to the pits for a new set of extreme tyres when the
rain hit hardest," Mallya said.
"As a team we will learn from this as we move forward to
China and Bahrain. We`re growing in confidence and potential
all the time so we just need a good race to demonstrate it,"
he added.
Bureau Report
