• British Grand Prix

Williams pays for sluggish start

Pastor Maldonado and Ruben Barrichello exchange words at the end of the race © Press Association

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• Race:
• British Grand Prix

• Drivers:
• Rubens Barrichello
• |
• Pastor Maldonado

• Teams:
• Williams

Williams' frustrations were again to the fore as the Rubens Barrichello and Pastor Maldonado both struggled early on after starting with a dry-race set-up, and both finished outside the points. Barrichello, who had started in a lowly 19th, recovered to finish 13th, while Maldonado, who had been seventh on the grid, came home 14th.

"It was quite difficult for us today especially with the light rain shortly before the start," Maldonado admitted. "Our car set-up was geared towards a dry race so we were compromised from the outset. Towards the end, our performance was better but by that stage it was too late. Unfortunately it wasn't the best weekend for us."

Barrichello held his own early on and then slowly climbed through the field. "We didn't have the best of starts and fell back quite a bit," he said. "Strangely, the car didn't feel good in the wet and it was a struggle to keep it on the track. It was also difficult to keep up with the guys in front of us. We had hoped for a better result at our home grand prix."

But the team's technical director, Sam Michael, said the early laps set the tone for the remainder of the day. "Compared to some of the guys in the top 10, our lap times on the dry tyre were respectable, but we just lost too much time in the opening laps to be able to make up any ground. We ran different strategies on the two cars to attempt to do something different to recover but it wasn't meant to be today."

© ESPNF1