Sunday, November 1, 2009

Ferrari has miserable end to year

Kimi Raikkonen and Giancarlo Fisichella reckoned they never had chance to show what they could in the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, as Ferrari's season ended with its two cars mired back in 12th and 16th places.

Raikkonen felt he could have turned his one stop strategy into a points finish had he enjoyed some clean air before his pit visit when his car was at its fastest, but at that stage he was following the two Brawns, which had rejoined ahead of him after their first of two stops and were therefore running relatively heavy at the time.

"I was stuck behind the two Brawns when they came out of the pits, so that was the end of our race," he said.

Fisichella made up ground from his back of the grid start early on, but then fell back again when he was penalised for speeding in the pit lane.

He eventually salvaged 16th in a spectacular late battle with Renault's Romain Grosjean.

"I did a good start and an aggressive first lap, and I gained four positions so it wasn't too bad," said Fisichella.

"But unfortunately with the drivethrough I lost a lot.

"At the end I was quick - I overtook Grosjean and when I was alone on the last two laps I did a 1m41.1s, 1s quicker than yesterday, which was good."

As Raikkonen prepared to leave the Ferrari garage for the last time pending his likely return to McLaren next year, he remained sanguine about the team's disappointing 2009 season.

"We got some good results even with the car that we had, but unfortunately we were never in a position to fight at the front at every race or fight for the championship," he said.

"It's disappointing, but that's how it goes."

Ferrari's failure to score today meant it stayed fourth in the constructors' championship behind arch-rival McLaren, which also left Abu Dhabi point-less following Lewis Hamilton and Heikki Kovalainen's mechanical problems.

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