1994 - ROUND 1 - BRAZIL
New car, new season, new sensations, new drivers, new teams... it´s always great to be back into the car once again. I´m very confident this season is really productive! The new engine is very good although the car doesn´t generate as much grip as the 107 (I reduced the grip of my car a bit in order to not have such an advantage for having a more powerful engine).
Qualifying
I wasn´t very happy with the handling but surprisingly everybody else was suffering grip problems as well so in the end the time was pretty good. It was great to see after that long 5 different cars on the top 6!
1. Senna -- 1.15.821
2. Schumacher -- 1.16.025
3. Hill -- 1.16.623
4. Hakkinen -- 1.16.702
5. Dagnall -- 1.16.936
6. Irvine -- 1.16.949
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21. Zanardi -- 1.18.128
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DNQ. Ratzenberger -- 1.20.612
DNQ. Gachot -- 1.21.155
Race
Lap 1 --> Irvine starts faster but goes to the right and we touch wheels, losing loads of time. I´m 10th at the 1st corner, then I pass Martini shortly afterwards. Barrichello must enter the pits after he hits another car
Lap 2 --> I pass Frentzen for 8th
Lap 3 --> I pass Irvine for 7th
Lap 4 --> Schumacher spins. 6th
Lap 7 --> Pass Wendlinger. 5th
Lap 9 --> Pass Alesi. 4th. Hakkinen is 8.0 ahead
Lap 13 --> Hakkinen is 9.7 ahead. Alesi 2.5 behind
Lap 14 --> Senna makes a mistake and gives the lead to Hill
Lap 16 --> I lose control at the entrance of the hairpin and spin. I´m demoted to 9th
Lap 18 --> I pass Morbidelli for 8th
Lap 19 --> Alesi pits. 7th
Lap 20 --> Pass Martini. 6th. Berger is 3.5 ahead
Lap 23 --> I make my first stop. I´m back in 17th
Lap 24 --> Morbidelli pits. 16th
Lap 25 --> Blundell, Martini and Panis pit. 13th
Lap 26 --> Hill spins losing loads of time! Schumacher pits. 11th
Lap 27 --> Irvine, Lehto and Berger pit. I pass Herbert. 7th
Lap 28 --> I pass Alesi. 6th
Lap 30 --> Barrichello pits. 5th. Wendlinger is 2.1 ahead
Lap 31 --> Katayama (who was running 3rd), pits. 4th. Wendlinger is around 1.5 secs ahead
Lap 36 --> Wendlinger pits. 3rd. Hakkinen is 27.3 ahead
Lap 38 --> After holding him for several laps, Schumacher finds his way through and I´m back to 4th. He quickly gets out of sight.
Lap 44 --> Hakkinen retires. 3rd. Schumacher is 11.8 ahead, Berger 3.0 behind
Lap 50 --> Schumacher and Berger pit.
Lap 51 --> Stop 2. I´m back to 5th but to my relief Berger retires.
Lap 52 --> Barrichello pits. 4th. Wendlinger is 9.4 ahead, having taken advantage of his new set of tyres.
Lap 54 --> Wendlinger pits. 3rd
Lap 56 --> Alesi is 8.3 behind.
Lap 59 --> Hill passes Alesi and is 6.1 behind.
Lap 63 --> Hill is 1.4 behind! Barrichello is close to him.
From lap 65 --> I hold Hill as long as I can.
Lap 71 (last) --> Hill is side by side at the last straight but my low-downforce approach to the setup gets me enough speed to finish 0.1 ahead of him and 0.4 ahead Barrichello for a podium finish!!
1. Ayrton Senna -- 1h36m59.402
2. Michael Schumacher -- +48.061
3. Chris Dagnall -- +1 lap
4. Damon Hill -- +1 lap
5. Rubens Barrichello -- +1 lap
6. Jean Alesi -- +1 lap
7. Karl Wendlinger -- +1 lap
8. Eddie Irvine -- +1 lap
9. Pierluigi Martini -- +1 lap
10. Gianni Morbidelli -- +1 lap
11. Olivier Panis -- +1 lap
12. Johnny Herbert -- +2 laps
13. Christian Fittipaldi -- +2 laps
14. Mark Blundell -- +2 laps
15. Alessandro Zanardi -- +2 laps
Fastest Lap -- Michael Schumacher - 1.18.441
DOTR -- Rubens Barrichello; Passed almost the whole field after a rubbish start to finish just 0.5 secs from the podium
ROTR -- Mark Blundell; Clearly outpaced by a brilliant Katayama.
Chris Dagnall said:
You can´t imagine how happy I am with this result. It´s probably ahead of the real possibilites of this car. Today there were faster drivers who finished behind us and that must be taken as a team win. The new engine works great but the car doesn´t produce the necessary downforce. We need to improve in this area in order to reach higher stakes
CHAMPIONSHIP STANDINGS - After 1 race
DRIVERS CHAMPIONSHIP
1. Ayrton Senna -- 10 pts
2. Michael Schumacher -- 6 pts
3. Chris Dagnall -- 4 pts
4. Damon Hill -- 3 pts
5. Rubens Barrichello -- 2 pts
6. Jean Alesi -- 1 pt
CONSTRUCTORS CHAMPIONSHIP
1. Williams-Renault -- 13 pts
2. Benetton-Ford -- 6 pts
3. Lotus-Mugen-Honda -- 4 pts
4. Jordan Hart -- 2 pts
5. Ferrari - 1 pt