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Another tough weekend for Team Ireland |
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Thursday, 16 November 2006 |
The whole A1 weekend in China was bit traumatic both for Team Ireland and the A1 organisation in general. The two practice sessions on Friday were cancelled when it was realised the the cars couldn't go around turn 8, a hairpin and loose manhole covers on the Saturday meant that the grid for the sprint race was decided by practice times from Saturday. As a result Michael Devaney started the sprint race from 11th position.
Probably the busiest car over the whole weekend as the Safety car and we saw lots of it. Team Africa crashed in the sprint race after it spun and partially blocked the track and unfortunately Mick was unable to avoid it. "There was nothing I could do because there were no yellow flags and I just came around the corner and found there was nowhere to go," said the young Rathfarnham driver. The car was damaged and required a new front nose which meant that Ireland rejoined in 21st position and wound up 20th at the finish after overtaking the Pakistan car. The sprint race was won by team Holland. Looks like Jos the Boss isn't being missed too much!
On to the Feature race and things didn't get much better for team Ireland. Michael Devaney struck the wall a glancing blow after 3 laps puncturing the left rear tyre and damaging the suspension. There was nothing I could really do about it. The cars in front were under heavy braking for the hairpin and as I tried to slow down and avoid hitting Lebanon in front of me I moved into the middle of the track. The car jumped out of line and the left rear hit the wall, enough to puncture the tyre and cause some damage. It`s been a difficult weekend here, we just don`t seem to have anything going our way at the moment". Team Italy won its first race in the series helped by the retirements of Holland and Germany and were followed home by team Great Britain's rising star, Oliver Jarvis finished a fine second on his A1 debut. Australia rounded out the podium. After three rounds Team Mexico are top of the pile and the next race is in Sepang, Malaysia on the weekend of the 24th -26th November.
TEAM IRELAND COMMENTS
Andy Miller, Race Engineer It's been a tough weekend what with the track time so limited by the problems with the track during practice and qualifying, and then the incident in the Sprint Race was one of those things that can easily happen on a tight street circuit where you can never know what`s just around the next corner. What happened in the Feature Race was also typical in that your speed is dictated by the cars in front and if you have to suddenly brake or go off line it can lead to trouble
Mark Gallagher, Team Principal Three races into the new A1GP season without any championship points scored is disappointing for the entire team, our sponsors and supporters back home. Having found some problems with the chassis after the last race and rectified them we just never seemed to get into this weekend at all. I think it`s fair to say everyone in the team is really frustrated with the position we are in at present.
TV COVERAGE UPDATE
RTE in their infinite wisdom are putting their highlights of the race in China on Friday morning (or Thursday night what ever way you look at it!) at 1.10am. The show is 30 minutes long. For those of you who can get channel 5 from the UK they are showing the races on the thursday morning after the race at approx 4.30am!!
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Last Updated ( Friday, 17 November 2006 )
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