Grand Prix d' Autriche

Question: David, you brought some cheer at the end of a sad weekend for McLaren.
David Coulthard: I'd just like to explain why I wasn't spraying the champagne for those at home who don't realise that we lost a very important member of the team, Paul Morgan, this weekend, and winning this Grand Prix is a big boost for everybody in the team.

Q: You ran an incredibly long first stint, longer than anyone else, and then you emerged in the lead. Was that the tactic?
DC: Yes. From where I was on the grid, having qualified seventh, it was important to start heavy and then just to have the options open, depending on how the race went. I was able to lean the engine out early on after the first few laps and save quite a few laps of fuel as well as obviously with the safety car and that enabled us to go quite long.

Q: Michael, can you put your finger on why you didn't get a good start?
Michael Schumacher: Not really. We had some kind of problem. Certainly the car didn't start in the way it was supposed to start, and basically I did a manual start afterwards, because there was some kind of problem but I'm sure we will find out why. You know all these systems are still very new and like we have seen with David, something happened to him in Barcelona with the system, now it happened to me, and I guess a few other people will still get surprises until everything is really reliable.

Q: Could you talk us through what happened with Juan Pablo Montoya?
MS: I was a little bit upset, obviously, because there was no way he could make that corner and all he was trying to do was take me with him out of the circuit. He was lost anyway. To do something to me then, I thought it wasn't really... What he should have done, because I had to go into the grass, I couldn't turn in, I nearly hit him, so it wasn't ideal, but that's the way it had gone and be sure I will have a word with him. But that meant that I was in sixth or seventh position and I had to work my way through the traffic which wasn't easy, because the Michelin drivers had problems with their tyres, so normally, sooner or later I would have passed Juan Pablo but the other guys were on Bridgestones and that was much more difficult. I had to wait until they did a few mistakes and then I took my chance to Panis and to Räikkönen who behaved very accurately and that allowed me to come back into the race and pick up the two guys in front.

Q: Rubens, why did you pull over to let Michael through?
Rubens Barrichello: The team has asked me to do that.

Q: Are you very unhappy about that?
RB: No. I am unhappy about the situation. I was winning almost the whole Grand Prix and then of course David went longer and I lost the race, basically like that. That's why I'm feeling unhappy.

Q: David. The deficit to Michael was eight points before the race, now it's halved to four points going to Monaco. What do you think about the rest of the season?
DC: Well, I think as you can see, the Grands Prix are going to be very close between ourselves and Ferrari, but Williams as well, so it's really going to come down to who gets their car and their tyres working well in Monaco. It's a circuit I enjoy, I've gone well there in the past, so there's everything to play for.