Virgin: D'Ambrosio beats three-stopping Glock

Virgin split their strategies leaving Timo Glock on three stop behind team mate Jerome D’Ambrosio.

	Timo Glock	Jerome d’Ambrosio
Qualifying position	22	21
Qualifying time comparison (Q1)	1’39.708 (+0.589)	1’39.119
Race position	21	20
Laps	54/56	54/56
Pit stops	3	2

Virgin drivers’ lap times throughout the race:

http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/charts/2011drivercolours.csv

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	22	23	24	25	26	27	28	29	30	31	32	33	34	35	36	37	38	39	40	41	42	43	44	45	46	47	48	49	50	51	52	53	54	55	56
Timo Glock	118.631	109.589	108.433	107.835	108.042	107.79	107.683	107.79	107.976	108.125	108.212	108.733	108.4	108.415	108.75	112.311	127.531	106.419	106.563	106.727	106.805	106.732	107.536	106.646	108.176	107.954	107.218	110.675	126.243	105.387	105.47	105.958	105.911	105.71	107.444	108.519	107.941	105.806	110.602	137.278	106.426	109.855	105.226	107.823	106.228	106.272	104.789	106.9	107.639	105.524	104.918	105.528	104.881	104.381
Jerome dAmbrosio	119.655	109.526	108.474	107.582	107.963	108.212	107.992	107.945	107.806	107.899	108.362	108.278	108.271	108.662	108.246	108.608	108.48	108.658	109.134	113.261	127.796	106.121	106.682	107.848	105.788	106.095	106.122	109.591	106.122	105.742	105.863	106.12	106.91	113.91	126.067	105.333	105.24	105.419	105.121	105.224	106.483	105.226	106.169	105.211	104.806	105.32	105.282	105.122	104.904	108.453	108.912	108.871	107.598	105.63

Timo Glock

Virgin split strategies on their cars. Glock made three stops running soft-soft-soft-hard as they tried to control rear tyre degradation.

But this compromised Glock’s race as he explained: “The team took the decision to convert to a three stop race but this was not the right way to go because we suffered massively with the blue flags.

“Then in the last stop the wheel didn?��t go on, which cost me a few seconds leaving the pits. Generally on the hard tyre the car was slightly better but in the beginning we just struggled.”

Timo Glock 2011 form guide

Jerome d’Ambrosio

D’Ambrosio suffered a moment late in final practice when the front wing failed on his car as he came out of the long turn 13.

However in qualifying he beat his more experienced team mate for the first time, by over half a second.

Glock overtook him at the start but D’Ambrosio finished the race ahead after running a two-stop strategy.

Jerome d’Ambrosio 2011 form guide

2011 Chinese Grand Prix

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10 comments on “Virgin: D’Ambrosio beats three-stopping Glock”

Todfod (@todfod)
18th April 2011, 12:19

Great job by D’Ambrosio, I didn’t expect him to outqualify and outrace his teammate this early in the season. Looks like Virgin went the right way by getting rid of DiGrassi.
BasCB (@bascb)
18th April 2011, 12:21

Good to see they tried something on strategy. But it excellently shows how strategy has a lot to do with actual position in the race.
1. bosyber (@bosyber)
  19th April 2011, 7:08
  
  Well said, I guess they didn’t have sufficiently fast times and tyre degradation to choose the most expedient moments for Glock’s stops, so he usually got dropped not too far before faster guys on the track, so that when his tyres had enough heat, he had to get off the throttle to let those cars by, and never really got into a good groove.
AndrewTanner (@andrewtanner)
18th April 2011, 13:41

Positive stuff from D’Ambrosio, hope he keeps it up.

I didn’t realise that the difference in qualifying was as much as 0.5s, pretty good!
Fixy (@)
18th April 2011, 14:38

Virgin split strategies on their cars.

How ridiculous Virgin, who had nothing to fight for, did this, and Ferrari did not. Massa should have followed Hamilton’s strategy.
Ben N
18th April 2011, 15:24

Glock doesn’t seem motivated, I don’t blame him at all. At least Kovalainen and Trulli (around his calibre) have the resources, backing and potential of Team Lotus… Glock seems to be fighting a losing battle.
SoLiDG (@solidg)
18th April 2011, 21:17

I’m glad to see D’Ambrosio showing so well compared to Timo. And he drove 3 good races. Doing many laps and gaining precious experience.
Let’s hope a better team can give him a ride coming years.
Same goes for Timo tough!
1. US_Peter (@us_peter)
  18th April 2011, 22:20
  
  Yeah, I didn’t see that coming at all. It’s a shame they haven’t made a step forward as Lotus has.
  1. AG
    20th April 2011, 19:50
    
    Many reasons for that:
    -Less money
    -no wind tunnel
    -Cosworth engine
    
    Branson said that he would give it two years. I wonder how he feels about their progress. He seems to be not that interested anymore and not on the grid too often.
Oliver
19th April 2011, 7:37

D’Ambrosio is still excited he is in F1. Glock is feeling like the average worker who is facing many years stuck in the same spot without the prospect of promotion. I wonder how long before he wants to bite Wirth’s head.