German GP McLaren race notes

The West McLaren Mercedes team was unable to finish today's Mobil 1 German Grand Prix after Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard retired with engine failures on laps 13 and 27 respectively. David remains second in the Drivers' World Championship with 47 points and Mika fifth with 19 points. West McLaren Mercedes is second in the Constructors' standings with 66 points.

David Coulthard
"It's been a difficult weekend and obviously I'm disappointed with today's result. I had a good battle with Rubens during the first couple of laps but was suffering from a lot of oversteer. I was aware that a number of cars were retiring but unfortunately I added to that statistic when the engine let go immediately after my pitstop. Hockenheim is a tough circuit which today's race result illustrates."

Mika Hakkinen
"I was very confident with the car and happy with the situation so it's a real shame that I was unable to finish the race. All of a sudden I felt vibration behind me, saw smoke and the engine stopped. However there is no point in being depressed and I'm confident that we will be pushing hard for the rest of the season."

Ron Dennis
"An obvious race of attrition and unfortunately we were part of it which makes any prediction of our potential finishing positions quite pointless. As always though we win as a team and lose as a team. We will now make good use of the short break in the intensive race schedule to focus on the problems and get some physical recuperation which all of the teams have been looking forward to."

Norbert Haug
"Not the result we would have liked to achieve here. We haven't been reliable enough to benefit from today's race, which had a high retirement rate. Our World Championship chances are now minimal, but we will not give up."

Chassis
Coulthard: MP4/16-05
Hakkinen: MP4/16-07
Spare: MP4/16-04