F1: Three former World Champions on the podium in Valencia as Alonso wins on home turf

Valencia, June 24, 2012 – By using a two-stop strategy, Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso became the first driver to win two races in the 2012 season, taking the championship lead thanks to an emotional victory on home territory. Alonso qualified 11th on the grid but made up 10 places.

Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel was leading by 20 seconds after qualifying on pole, until a safety car period halfway through the race. The German came in for a set of mediums that he hoped would take him to the end of the race after two stints on the soft tyres, he re-joined the race in the lead. But shortly after the re-start, Vettel retired with a technical problem and local hero Alonso went in front, having also stopped during the safety car period to bolt on his final set of medium tyres.

Lotus driver Romain Grosjean was following a similar tyre strategy to Alonso and was in a strong position to challenge the Ferrari until he succumbed to a technical problem as well, on lap 40. The final podium positions were only decided in the closing laps, after a dramatic finish characterised by incidents and overtaking.

Kimi Raikkonen was second for Lotus ahead of Mercedes driver Michael Schumacher. Raikkonen also took advantage of the safety car period to change his final set of tyres, while Schumacher was on a different strategy. Third place for Schumacher – the highest placed on the grid (12th) of only five drivers to start the race on the medium tyre – was also his best result of the year and the first podium of his comeback, after a spectacular charge in the final laps on the soft tyre. Once again, three different cars and engine manufacturers were represented on the podium, driven by three world champions.

Force India’s Paul di Resta was the only driver to use a one-stop strategy, stopping to change from soft to medium tyres on lap 23 and in the process becoming the driver who completed the longest run on each tyre: 23 laps on the soft and 34 laps on the medium. Di Resta finished seventh, just two places behind his two-stopping team mate Nico Hulkenberg, whose fifth place was also the best result of his career.

Driver Quotes

1st Fernando Alonso -Ferrari – “This has been an unforgettable day for me and I can’t find the right words to express my feelings! Winning in my country is an indescribable emotion: I still remember the victory in Barcelona in 2006 and winning today in Valencia with this fantastic team, is amazing, especially when we are going through such a difficult time at the moment in Spain. It’s nice that sport and I’m thinking of the wins for the national football team and Nadal, might be able to give people something to smile about. Stopping on the slowing down lap? I don’t know what happened but it came at the right moment, because I was in front of the grandstands and I was able to celebrate with my fans! Sport always delivers the same lessons in that there are highs and lows and things change quickly. Yesterday we didn’t make it to Q3 and today we have won: it means that we should never give up, right to the chequered flag. It’s a nice present for everyone who has come from far away, maybe even sleeping in their cars and then staying in the grandstands in this torrid heat. At the start, it was not easy to make up places and I tried to delay the braking to the maximum at Turn 4, staying on the outside. Then I started to fight my way up and, after the Safety Car, I began to think a podium could be possible. Then I attacked Grosjean and managed to pass him, although I was worried that I might have sustained some damage when we touched. After two or three corners I realised everything was alright and I relaxed. When I went into the lead after Vettel retired, we were all hoping the tyres would last to the end. I was always talking to my engineer who told me I was running the same pace as those following me: in the end, there was not much left, but unlike Canada, the others were in the same situation. It was emotional being on the podium with Andrea Stella, because he has also worked with Michael and Kimi: he could celebrate in the best way possible a totally unexpected win, given our grid position. Thinking back to yesterday, what happened confirms there is still a lot of work to be done and we have to be honest about this, to ourselves and to our fans. We will do all we can to win this championship, but we still don’t have the quickest car and we must push to reach this objective as quickly as possible.”

2nd – Kimi Räikkönen, Lotus-“Second place is okay but the win is what I really wanted. We didn’t quite have the pace for it today. I got a good start but I was blocked by Pastor (Maldonado) at the first right-hander and lost quite a few places which put me a bit behind. We made a good recovery from that position and had quite a hard fight with a few people – overtaking and being overtaken. I couldn’t get the tyres up to temperature quickly enough after the safety car, and I made a small mistake on the re-start lap too. I was able to fight back as we had good race pace again. Today was close but the race win was just out of reach.”

3rd Michael Schumacher, Mercedes – “Wow, I did not even think of getting on the podium for any second in the race today, so what a wonderful result! Finally it happened! After such a long time waiting and for jumping on the podium so unexpectedly, I feel extra happy. I think that was the best answer to give to everybody who started doubting our work: get the car together and fight back; never give up, as anything can happen. A big thank you to the team and to everybody who kept on believing we would get on the podium again. That’s what team work is about. A special word for my mechanics and engineers who have done a fantastic job this weekend after some difficult races this year. I didn’t think a podium was possible – not even at the end of the race, because it was pretty busy in the last laps and I had lost count of where I was. Then when I crossed the line, I asked the guys where I was and they said “Third – on the podium!” It’s one of those moments that you enjoy deeply as a driver. We were close a couple of times but it was great for it to happen in a spectacular race like this, through strategy and lots of passing on a circuit where overtaking is difficult.”

Jenson Button – McLaren – “This was a really difficult race to read. I got a poor start, was boxed in at Turn One, and had to lift to prevent Fernando [Alonso] and myself hitting the wall at Turn Two.I don’t think we did a bad job in terms of strategy – the car felt good and kept improving during the race – but, when the Safety Car was deployed, I think a few others lucked in to a better strategy. And, today, also, we just didn’t get lucky.Finally, massive congratulations to Fernando – he did a great job. Hopefully we can do the same thing at our home grand prix in two weeks’ time!”

Lewis Hamilton – McLaren “Big congratulations to Fernando – he did a great job today to come from all the way back in 11th. We lost some points today – fortunately, however, a couple of other drivers fighting at the front also missed out, so it’s not the end of the world. It just makes things a little bit tougher. Today was just a bad day in the office – but that’s motor racing, and I’m already looking forward to the next grand prix, my home race at Silverstone.”

Pastor Maldonado-Williams – “It was an unlucky race for us as we were looking strong for a podium finish. We were struggling at the beginning of the race but at the end I passed Lewis (Hamilton) and then he came back across. I jumped across the kerb but there was nothing I could do and we made contact. I was on a great lap after a great race. The car was feeling good and we had good pace.”

Bruno Senna-Williams – “I feel quite disappointed with today as we had good pace and the right strategy. It would have been difficult but it was working for us. However, after losing time with the puncture and then receiving the drive-through penalty it would have been difficult to get into the points even in a race like today. We got lucky with the timing of the safety car but on a positive note we had good tyre management and so we were looking competitive. Now we need to put it behind us and see it as a lesson learned.”

Heikki Kovalainen, – Caterham – “My start wasn’t the best I’ve had this year but I was keeping pace with Webber and Ricciardo for the first few laps. Unfortunately we had a KERS issue early on and that obviously hit my pace for the whole race. We had opted for a two stop strategy so for the first stint I was looking after the tyres until we boxed. The stop went well and my pace was good but then Vergne made what looks like a rookie mistake, hit me and I had to come in for a new nose. From that point I was just trying to get to the end of the race and with about five or six laps left the tyres were gone. Despite that 13th and 14th is another decent result for the team. We’ve had a very good weekend here and now we can look forward to making more gains at the next race so we leave on a positive note.”

Nico Hulkenburg – Force India – “A great result for everyone in the team today and for me personally. Fifth place is a great achievement after a very long and difficult race. The two-stop strategy worked well, but the last stint was very long and it was hard to hold off the cars behind me on fresher tyres in the last few laps. So the race was a bit messy at times, but very entertaining and it feels great to come through and score such a good result for the team. We got a bit lucky with some cars dropping out, but we were in the right place to capitalise on things so I’m very happy about today.”

Romain Grosjean, Lotus-“Basically the car lost power and switched off. I couldn’t even call my engineer on the radio as the radio was dead. The race was almost perfect up until that point: we had a good start and a good strategy. I don’t think we were that far from our first win. The positives of this weekend are that we battled right at the front and we showed good pace. Sebastian (Vettel) was very strong and I don’t know if we could have caught him. When he had his issue, I was in second place behind Fernando (Alonso) and it was then that I thought we could challenge for the lead because we knew that our tyre degradation was going to be less than his. Unfortunately fate decided otherwise”

Nico Rosberg- Mercedes – “That was a really exciting race. I had a bad first few laps and lost positions, then the Safety Car came out at a bad moment for me. After the restart, I thought I would end up finishing out of the points, because I had the oldest tyres and therefore no grip, which made it very hard to defend. We had planned to try a one-stop strategy but had to convert to two stops, and thanks to the strategy guys, we were on fresh tyres when everybody else was struggling. I was in P12 on lap 47 and P6 at the end, so it clearly worked and we are very happy with a good team result after such a chaotic race, with two cars in the top six. A great result for Michael with his podium and I am happy to score some more nice points.”