One race from scoring his first F1 points in Sepang Toro Rosso pilot Jaime Alguersuari again feels he had the pace to score points, only for incidents and accidents to drop him to a 13th place finish.
“On the slick tyres, we were really fast and I got past Sutil and there were some good passing moves,” said Alguersuari. “But I'm disappointed with the result.”
The young Spaniard started from 12th, briefly running as high as fifth before contact with an unnamed HRT driver he was trying to lap broke the Toro Rosso's front wing.
“[He, the HRT car] was slower than me and was shown the blue flag, but he moved from side to side,” related an annoyed driver. “I tried to get past on the right, but he came back on me and touched my wing.”
That incident, which ultimately brought out the safety car to pick up the debris followed a lap one scare where Jaime believed he had clipping Kamui Kobayashi. In the early safety car (more on that later) he was able to bring the car back to the pits for a check, the team reporting no damage.
The race topped off an expensive weekend for the team, Sebastien Buemi suffering a spectacular and well-publicised suspension failure in first practice which had repercussions on the remainder of his Shanghai weekend.
“Not running on Friday was my first problem,” he explained. “Because that means you don't qualify so well and once you have to start the race from the middle of the pack.”
That mid pack start was to lead to him being involved in an opening lap crash – his second of the season, when Tonio Liuzzi span in turn six. It was an incident Buemi diplomatically claimed he didn't blame anyone for before continuing “but Liuzzi lost his and crashed into me.”
