21/10/2002

Allan McNish reflects on Suzuka

My qualifying accident at 130R was without doubt the biggest topic of my weekend! On my first qualifying run on Saturday afternoon I found that the car was a bit too reactive a bit too 'pointy.' So I didn't push too much once I got through the centre section of the lap.

We made an adjustment to the front anti-roll bar and it was much better through the fast sweepers in sector one. By the time we got to 130R we were six tenths faster and it was just fine all the way through until the last moment when the car snapped suddenly into big oversteer.

I put the opposite lock on - it was very heavy - and then it had a big reaction the other way and all of a sudden I was going backwards and was just waiting to hit something. I don't actually remember going over the barrier but I do remember the car hitting the ground on its head and then landing on its wheel again.

I just wanted to get out and get away from it. I knew to get up onto the banking. And then after that I took my helmet off and it was a case of making sure that everything was working. I took an awful hit in a place that a man shouldn't! I had a bit of a lie down because although I knew that all my major functions were okay I wasn't feeling 100%...

I rested up for the remainder of the day and when I got to the circuit on Sunday I didn't feel as sore as I thought I was going to. I didn't have much whiplash because I'd gone in backwards and the right knee was what suffered most. We went and had a chat with Professor Sid Watkins the FIA medical chief and they let me do the warm-up. I had to go back down afterwards and they didn't feel it was right for me to continue.

I did have a lump on my calf which they had to drain the fluid out of and they were just a bit concerned that over a long race distance something else might happen. At the end of the day I know about cars engineers know about chassis and doctors know about bodies. That's why they are there and you have to respect their decisions.

I've only raced at Suzuka twice but I tested a lot there for McLaren back in the early nineties so I was looking forward to racing the TF102 and hoping to end the season on a high. I did go out in style but not in quite the way I'd hoped!

Basically I felt deflated. I watched the race on the monitors in the back of the garage. We only had two or three channels up but the digital feed is very very good. You could certainly see the people who had been to Suzuka and those who hadn't. There was quite a dramatic difference in lines. Not so much through the sweepers but at the hairpin for instance and a little bit into Spoon Corner and in the braking areas. I certainly didn't want to finish up spectating! That was not on the agenda.

On Monday after the race both myself and Mika attended two public events one in Nagoya and the other in Toyota City. The Nagoya event was quite a relaxed affair. Around 200 people were invited and enthusiastically came along to support the team. We were presented with some flowers and a rather life-like caricature of ourselves which will take pride of place back home. There were some 2000 fans at the second event in Toyota city again with flags and banners. It was unbelievable to see just the huge level of support that Toyota has in Japan. In fact both myself and Mika felt a bit like movie stars!

Looking back over the last year the most frustrating thing is not scoring points because I should have done. That's a frustration in this game. It's disappointing not to be part of the Toyota programme next year and reap some of the benefit of the hard work. But I'm not exactly one to look back or agonise too long. More importantly there have been a lot of positives. I've raced in Formula 1 with Toyota we've had four good years and now a new chapter opens.