until clutch problems intervene

Mechanical woes thwart Brazilian’s bid for second win of the campaign

Bruno Senna made a flying start from pole position to dominate the early stages of yesterday afternoon’s GP2 Series race at Magny-Cours, France, but his victory hopes were compromised when his clutch began to slip after a dozen laps.

Senna tried to nurse the car and was able to maintain consistent, competitive lap times, so much so that he stayed ahead of closest challenger Giorgio Pantano (Racing Engineering) when the duo made their mandatory tyre stops on the 19th of 41 scheduled laps.

Romain Grosjean (ART) split the two leaders as they rejoined… and one lap later the Franco-Swiss driver passed Senna at the Adelaide hairpin. The Brazilian’s clutch failed completely soon afterwards and he will be forced to start tomorrow morning’s sprint race from 23rd place.

Bruno Senna

“I think that was just plain bad luck. I was pacing myself in the early stages, looking after the car and making sure I didn’t work the tyres too hard. The car was handling really well and I thought we were in good shape. The clutch started to slip after about 12 laps, as I changed from fifth to sixth gear, so I began short-shifting and did everything I could not to put the system under too much strain. My lap times were still good, despite the problem, but shortly after my stop the clutch began slipping between fourth and fifth and then it simply packed up altogether.

“This should have been our race. Even with the problem I was sure I would be able to score a strong points finish, but it wasn’t to be. This has left me with a mountain to climb on Sunday, but I’ll do what I can to get something from the race.”