Sunday 25.03.2012
The Barwa Addax team did not get the best possible results during the GP2 opening weekend in Malaysian Sepang but there were no doubts about its potential and the effort of all concerned.
The drivers including Czech Josef Král, the mechanics, engineers and the management are all convinced that they can reach new heights in the coming season. Although not reflected by the results, the team is satisfied with the progress and racing speed of both drivers which shows they are among the best. One of drawbacks of the opening weekend was novices who literally got in the way of more experienced drivers during practices and qualifying. The result was that many favourites were not able to make reasonable times.
After finishing fourteenth in Saturday’s feature race Josef Král started from the same position in the Sunday sprint race.
And again, Král had an excellent start and moved forward several places but then lost them in scuffles on the first corners. By the end of the race he was even the fastest driver on the track and crossed the finish line in promising ninth position. “Generally it was a hard weekend and we were missing that little bit of luck,” said Josef Král at the end of the racing week. "I didn’t have a single clean lap in the qualifying although individual sector times were really very good! And this determined the rest of the weekend. I made a really good start in Sunday’s race but in the first corner I had to go pretty wide which lost me several positions. Then I tried to save my tyres so that they would be ready for the end of the race. I managed to get in front of a few cars and finally finished ninth. It wasn’t an ideal weekend at all but we showed that there is potential. We definitely need a better starting position for the next race in Bahrain. Then I am sure we can push through! Until then we have some time to analyze the data and find out how to improve our performance.”
