Following mounting speculation about the future of driver Ralf Schumacher, the Toyota team have said that his form is partly their fault. The rumours were not helped on Monday when Pascal Vasselon, technical director at Toyota, admitted that the “general grip” problem which bugged Schumacher at Monaco was down to “no obvious limitation of one parameter.”
However John Howett has lept to the driver’s defence. “We were convinced that he will win win a grand prix for us,” Howett began. “But we have to admit that it has not happened because of our car and not because of Ralf.”
Meanwhile, Schumacher’s ex-manager Willi Weber is surprised by Schumacher’s problems. It was Weber who negotiated the $20 million contract between Toyota and the German driver just before they parted ways. “He finds himself in a downward spiral that continues to get worse,” Weber said. “Monaco shocked me – that he hung around behing Albers for so long seeming to not be able to do anything about it. It’s not the Ralf I know.”
Schumacher himself is remaining upbeat and is hopeful of a better race this weekend. “We are working hard on the issues we had in Monaco and I hope we’ll see an improvement in Canada,” he said.
