Brits on Pole

Red Bull Racing’s David Coulthard’s Monza weekend began with a 400 Euro fine for speeding in the pitlane - and just went downhill from there.

His qualifying efforts were wrecked by his team’s trick gearbox, his race ended in a first-lap, high speed crash and, to cap it all, news broke that he’d had to petition for a winding up order on a hotel he co-owns in Nottinghamshire.

The Scot made a great start to the race, gaining five places on his grid position of 20th, but quickly fell victim to a spectacular crash that brough the safety car out for several laps.

Coulthard said afterwards: “I touched the back of Fisichella’s car in the middle of the first chicane and broke my front wing.

“When I accelerated, the downforce pushed the wing underneath the front of the car and broke the steering. I went straight off the track and into the tyres, that was the end of the weekend.”

Red Bull boss Christian Horner said: “David had what looked to be a nasty accident after making contact with Fisichella at the chicane. The impact damaged his front wing, which caused it to collapse through the next fast right hander.

“Effectively, he was a passenger for the rest of his journey across the grass into the tyre barrier. Thankfully he’s totally uninjured.”

Earlier this week the Telegraph reported that Coulthard had applied to a Nottingham court for a winding up order in relation to the Dakota Sherwood Park Hotel, which he co-owns with a Chicago property developer and a Scottish hotelier.

The newspaper claimed Coulthard had personally lent the hotel hundreds of thousands of pounds and quoted a spokesman for the driver as saying the petition had been filed because of “non-compliance with a statutory demand for the payment of debt”.

However, the paper also quoted hotelier Ken McCulloch as saying the hotel is a great success with big plans for the future, and the petition was an issue between shareholders that would soon be settled.

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