German GP McLaren notes

Germany Grand Prix 28th - 30th July '95 Hockenheim

Despite suffering the retirements of both cars, the Marlboro McLaren Mercedes team enjoyed one of its most competitive showings of the season. Mika Hakkinen was running third comfortably ahead of Gerhard Berger when his engine failed only 12 laps from the end. Mark Blundell had retired earlier in the race with a similar problem while in fourth place behind his team mate.

Mika Hakkinen: "It was a difficult race from the start, which I consider quite good but not spectacular. My car was a bit heavy at the beginning as we had opted for a one-refulling stop strategy. Although it was not easy for me to run at the same pace as the leading cars, my lap times were still rather good. I suspect that changing winds made the engine rev higher along the straight and with about 20 laps to go, my engine started to feel tighter and tighter. With 12 laps to go, it just broke.

Mark Blundell: "I am disappointed because we lost a fantastic result due to a problem with the engine. However, with the bad news comes the good news that we have made progress with the Mercedes V10 and with the chassis; we are moving steadily up the grid both in qualifying and in race pace, and this is encouraging for the next race."

Norbert Haug: "Mika's performance today was good. Unfortunately, with 12 laps to go, we lost the pressure of the pneumatic valve system in the engine. Nevertheless, this race represents a good step in terms of lap times compared to the best ones. We have never been so close to the leader, and considering the fact the we planned to do only one fuel stop, Mika's lap times have been very encouraging. We took a risk with the new engine specification, but with this level of performance, we now have to work even harder to make sure that we are realiable."

Ron Dennis: "There's always disappointment when you do not make it to the finish, but we were significantly more competitive today then in previous races. When you are trying hard to catch up, you have to accept the risk of unreliability. This is just part of motor racing. The results will come, we just have to be patient."