San Marino GP Prost race notes

Jean Alesi:
"I did not have a good start, as I had to jump on the brakes because of a Benetton which was blocking ahead of me. It is very difficult to overtake here at Imola, especially when you are in 15th position on the grid. I was on a two-stop strategy, the first one for very early in the race. My car was handling fine, just like in this morning's warm-up. My pit-stop went very well but unfortunately, soon after, I had to slow down because I felt my throttle was not responding. I had a failure in the hydraulic system which forced me out of the race. It's very frustrating because this was an important race for us considering our difficult start to the season. I am very sorry for the team who have made so much effort. Only by continuing to work together will we overcome all of this."

Nick Heidfeld:
"The team has been very unfortunate during the whole week-end. However we had managed to find a good set-up this morning during the warm-up, which made me feel confident for the race. On the grid, my engine stalled and the team tried to help me during the last seconds before the formation lap, unfortunately, we went overtime and that is why I got a 10 second stop and go penalty. Then from the 6th lap on, the team saw that the hydraulic pressure was going down and I finally had to retire. It is really a pity because the car was going quite well in terms of lap times even though I had to start a lot further back, maybe 50 seconds behind the field. I hope we will make some progress during the next tests and get more competitive."

Alain Prost:
"We have to continue working on our reliability before we can hope to obtain any results. It will be high on our priorities at next week's test."

Corrado Provera:
"As long as our two cars were in the race, Jean Alesi for 26 laps and Nick Heidfeld for 24, the lap times confirmed the progress made in terms of overall performance. Once again, however, our reliability let us down today and unfortunately we have to wait to gain the rewards of all the hard work done by the Prost Peugeot team."