Di Resta's race wreckedposted in F124 | 07 | 2011
BATHGATE'S PAUL DI RESTA was again left, through no fault of his own, contemplating 'what might have been' after his German Grand Prix was ruined by another incident caused by Renault's Nick Heidfeld.
The German, who cut across the 25-year-old Scot's Force India during the Canadian Grand Prix forcing Di Resta to pit for a new nose cone for his car, this time pitched the Bathgate driver into a spin as the car's entered Turn 3 on the opening lap at the Nurburgring.
"Obviously I'm not happy," Di Resta (pictured), who was lying 11th when he was hit, stated. The Scot rejoined the field in 24th and last place but fought through to finish 13th.
"I'd made up a couple of places at the start and was racing next to Michael (Schumacher) when I was hit from behind. It could only have been Heidfeld because he was the one who was stopped behind me when I spun round."
McLaren's Lewis Hamilton dominates German Grand Prix
The stewards took an unsavoury view of the German's involvement in the crash and slapped a drive-though penalty on him.
The incident though left Di Resta, who now hasn't scored since for seven grands prix after scoring in his opening two races, frustrated. To rub salt into the wound, his team-mate Adrian Sutil finished sixth.
"Two weeks ago I was lying seventh when we had the pitstop problem at Silverstone, and today I miss out because I got thumped up the rear. The whole incident was out of my control; he just hit me from behind and spun me.
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"It's been a difficult weekend. It’s a shame because we came here with a great package and we had a good strategy for the race. I pushed hard to recover, but points were just out of reach today.
"The good news is that Adrian has brought in a lot of points and shown just how competitive the car is. Hopefully my luck will change when we get to Hungary this weekend.”
The race was won by McLaren's Lewis Hamilton, who dominated the race ahead of Ferrari's Fernando Alonso and the Red Bull of Mark Webber. World champion Sebastian Vettel, who still leads the title race by 77 points from his Red Bull team-mate, finished a distant fourth.
Watch Jackie Stewart's stunning drive on the old Nurburgring
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Jim McGill