Canada Grand Prix – Results: 8th

Source: autosport.com | lotusf1team.com | twitter |

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Key Moments:

Lap 1 – Romain drops one place to Paul Di Resta through the first chicane, Kimi jumps above Kamui Kobayashi (P8 / P11 respectively)
Lap 6 – Both drivers profit from Felipe Massa’s spin at Turn 2 to move into P7 / P10
Lap 14 – Kimi passes Jenson Button, Romain sets the fastest lap of the race
Lap 21 – Romain pits for soft tyres
Lap 38 – Nico Rosberg pits for the second time, promoting Romain one position
Lap 41 – Kimi pits for super softs, passing Nico Rosberg
Lap 42 – Nico Rosberg re-passes Kimi, Sergio Perez also jumps the Finn in the stops
Lap 52 – Mark Webber pits, Romain up to P4
Lap 58 – Felipe Massa pits, Kimi up to P8
Lap 63 – Sebastian Vettel pits, Romain up to P3
Lap 66 – Romain passes Fernando Alonso to take P2
Lap 70 – Romain crosses the line in P2, Kimi in P8

Summary:

A clean getaway for both drivers, with Romain slightly cautious through the first two turns; consequently losing a place to Paul Di Resta and dropping to P8. Kimi quickly moved past Kamui Kobayashi on the first lap to take P11, before closing straight onto the back of Jenson Button.

With 10 laps down, Romain found himself sitting right under the rear wing of Nico Rosberg in P6 while Kimi continued to pressure the aforementioned McLaren which was struggling in the early stages on the soft tyres.

Lap 14 brought a roar of excitement from the Lotus F1 Team garage, as Kimi passed Jenson Button into the final chicane with a DRS assisted move, surging away from the McLaren as soon as he hit clear air. Romain meanwhile was busy setting the fastest lap of the race, adding to the delight of the crew. Lap 21 saw the team’s first stop of the day, with Romain making the switch to the yellow marked soft compound Pirelli tyres and emerging just behind Nico Rosberg – the same position he had occupied previously.

As half distance approached, the race settled into a consistent pattern with Romain hanging on to the coat tails of Nico Rosberg, and Kimi doggedly continuing on the same soft tyres with which he started the race; matching the paced of the cars ahead despite sporting significantly more worn rubber. With Nico Rosberg pitting on lap 38, Romain finally found himself in clean air and flew straight up to the back Mark Webber. Kimi meanwhile pitted for his first and only stop three laps later; taking on the red marked super soft compound tyres and simultaneously following his team-mate in leapfrogging the Mercedes.

This was not to last however, as the German used his DRS to re-pass the Finn into the final chicane on the following lap. Unfortunately for the 2007 World Champion, this battle also allowed Sergio Perez to move past following the Mexican’s stop, demoting Kimi a further position. As the field finally reshuffled following the stops, Romain found himself in P5 with Kimi now inside the points positions in P9. Webber’s second stop on lap 52 gifted Romain yet another position – now up to P4 with Kimi subsequently clambering all over the back of the Red Bull as it emerged from the pit lane.

Lap 58 saw Felipe Massa forced to dive into the pits as his tyres fell off the cliff, with Kimi profiting to take P8 and continuing to press the back of Mark Webber. Just 5 laps later and Sebastian Vettel also caved to the degradation from his tyres, diving in for fresh rubber and promoting Romain into the podium places. The Frenchman then latched onto the back of Fernando Alonso, who was similarly struggling to make the end of the race on severely worn tyres.

Just a few laps later and Romain was putting heavy pressure on the Ferrari, eventually passing the Spaniard on lap 66 to take P2 with just a few laps to spare, before amazingly starting to close on leader Lewis Hamilton. As the chequered flag dropped, Romain crossed the line to take P2 – the best result of his F1 career to date – with Kimi bringing his E20 home in P8 to complete a good haul of points for the team.

Pos--Driver-------Team-----------------------Time
 1.  Hamilton      McLaren-Mercedes           1h32:29.586
 2.  Grosjean      Lotus-Renault              +     2.513
 3.  Perez         Sauber-Ferrari             +     5.260
 4.  Vettel        Red Bull-Renault           +     7.295
 5.  Alonso        Ferrari                    +    13.411
 6.  Rosberg       Mercedes                   +    13.842
 7.  Webber        Red Bull-Renault           +    15.085
 8.  Raikkonen     Lotus-Renault              +    15.567
 9.  Kobayashi     Sauber-Ferrari             +    24.432
10.  Massa         Ferrari                    +    25.272
11.  Di Resta      Force India-Mercedes       +    37.693
12.  Hulkenberg    Force India-Mercedes       +    46.236
13.  Maldonado     Williams-Renault           +    47.052
14.  Ricciardo     Toro Rosso-Ferrari         +  1:04.475
15.  Vergne        Toro Rosso-Ferrari         +     1 lap
16.  Button        McLaren-Mercedes           +     1 lap
17.  Senna         Williams-Renault           +     1 lap
18.  Kovalainen    Caterham-Renault           +     1 lap
19.  Petrov        Caterham-Renault           +     1 lap
20.  Pic           Marussia-Cosworth          +    2 laps

Fastest lap: Vettel, 1:15.752

Not classified/retirements: 
Driver-------Team---------------------On lap
Glock         Marussia-Cosworth            57
Schumacher    Mercedes                     34
De la Rosa    HRT-Cosworth                 25
Karthikeyan   HRT-Cosworth                 23

World Championship standings, round 7: 
Drivers:--------------------Constructors: 
 1.  Hamilton      88        1.  Red Bull-Renault          164
 2.  Alonso        86        2.  McLaren-Mercedes          133
 3.  Vettel        85        3.  Lotus-Renault             108
 4.  Webber        79        4.  Ferrari                    97
 5.  Rosberg       67        5.  Mercedes                   69
 6.  Raikkonen     55        6.  Sauber-Ferrari             58
 7.  Grosjean      53        7.  Williams-Renault           44
 8.  Button        45        8.  Force India-Mercedes       28
 9.  Perez         37        9.  Toro Rosso-Ferrari          6
10.  Maldonado     29       
11.  Kobayashi     21       
12.  Di Resta      21       
13.  Senna         15       
14.  Massa         11       
15.  Hulkenberg     7       
16.  Vergne         4       
17.  Schumacher     2       
18.  Ricciardo      2

Lotus team quotes:

Kimi Raikkonen – 8th: “The car was a bit better in the race than it was in qualifying. I seemed to get stuck behind people a few times. The DRS zone is not very long, and it’s still a difficult battle if the car ahead of you is also using the DRS. We had a chance to do a bit better, but it didn’t quite all come together today. We scored points again so that’s always a good thing, especially this season. Qualifying yesterday wasn’t perfect so obviously that left us with more work to do. If you start further forward it’s easier to finish higher up the order. We’ll try to achieve that in the next race. “

Eric Boullier, Team Principal: “Today’s result is due to very good team work and keeping focused on the task at hand. The E20 was very well setup for the race, our strategies worked for both cars to finish much higher than they started and both drivers drove superbly. Romain drove an excellent race and P2 is superb for the whole team, especially everyone at Enstone who keeps pushing to develop every area of the car. We know that if we can get more in qualifying we will be able to achieve even better things in the races, so that is our task ahead.”

Alan Permane, Director of Trackside Operations: “Today all went very much to plan. Coming into the race we were fairly confident that we could do a one stop strategy; it would be a bit tight on the tyres, but it was clear from Friday that the tyres had the pace and the durability to do one stop. Today was a lot hotter, and we had a fall back of a two stop strategy, which we didn’t need. Romain did everything he needed today and it’s a well deserved result. For Kimi we used the opposite tyre strategy from Romain by starting him on the soft tyre and it worked for him to finish four places higher than he started in what was a very competitive race. It’s two very solid drives we’ve had today so we’re very happy to bounce back from Monaco in emphatic fashion. ”

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