Panasonic Toyota Racing will leave Kuala Lumpur with two points following Jarno Trulli's 7th place finish at today's Malaysian Grand Prix. Following yesterday's strong performance in qualifying, Trulli and team-mate Ralf Schumacher lined up in 8th and 9th on the grid. Unfortunately both lost ground at the start and from there it was a long, hard race for both drivers. Trulli stayed in the top ten all race on his way to the points. Schumacher was less fortunate and lost further ground when he suffered a slow puncture shortly after his first pit stop and had to fuel until the end of the race, eventually taking 15th place.
Trulli said: "I'm happy to have come home in the points and I've had a good weekend. I fought hard throughout, the car worked well and we made the most of everything. The only pity was the start which wasn't so great and meant that I ended up behind Fisichella for much of the race. I was quicker than him in the first stint but at this circuit whoever's in front tends to stay there. Still, we kept up a good pace and I was able to put in consistently quick laps until the last ten laps when I couldn't attack any harder due to some minor technical problems. Nevertheless this is a good result and I'd like to thank the team because we made no mistakes throughout the weekend."
Schumacher commented: "It's been a difficult weekend for me since the start and today was one of those days when everything went wrong. The car didn't get away well and then I had to avoid Jarno and I lost a few places. From then on I was stuck in traffic for the first part of the race. Shortly after my first pit stop I had a slow puncture and I needed to make another unscheduled pit stop. That meant I was heavy on fuel and the balance was not good. In general it was a tough race for no points. But Bahrain is coming next and I hope to do better there. Jarno's result shows that we have the pace to challenge with both cars."
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