French GP: Michelin race notes

ALONSO KEEPS MICHELIN AHEAD IN F1 TITLE CONTESTS

Fernando Alonso (Renault/Michelin) finished second in today's French Grand Prix at Magny-Cours to maintain his comfortable lead in this year's Formula One title race - and keep his team well ahead in the championship for constructors.

The Spaniard ran third in the early stages, but his two-stop strategy enabled him to split the Ferraris and record his 10th top-two finish in this season's 11 races. Kimi Räikkönen (McLaren Mercedes, fifth), Giancarlo Fisichella (Renault, sixth), Pedro de la Rosa (McLaren Mercedes, seventh) and Nick Heidfeld (BMW Sauber F1 Team, eighth) also scored points on Michelin tyres.

Nick Shorrock, Michelin Formula One director:

"It is obviously disappointing that we weren't able to convert our consistency into another race victory, but results like this simply inspire us to do better next time. We accept that we need to increase our performance and will be evaluating a number of ideas this week. We brought 10 different products to this race and used six of them today."

"We tried some very aggressive 'option' tyres earlier in the weekend, but by general consensus they might have suffered over a full race distance because of the extremely high track temperatures. That would clearly have been a faster tyre over one lap and it gives us a baseline on which to work for the forthcoming races."

"Our partners are still leading both world championships- and there will be no let-up as we strive to give all of them a tyre capable of winning the German Grand Prix later this month."

Pat Symonds, executive engineering director, Renault F1 Team:

"Today's track temperatures of more than 50 degrees were a severe test for the tyres. We had high hopes that Michelin's consistency would give us an edge over Ferrari, but unfortunately that wasn't the case."

"We have accepted all along that the tyre battle is going to swing back and forth throughout the year and we know that Michelin's engineers are always absolutely committed. They'll be working flat out to make sure things swing back in its partners' favour at Hockenheim."

-michelin-