Wednesday 10th February 2010
Sutil confident Force is with him
Force India driver Adrian Sutil is confident the team can achieve better things this year with the new VJM03.
The new car will have its first official test in Jerez on Wednesday but pictures were released for the first time on Tuesday.
The team had an impressive season in last year's car which saw them come from the back of the grid to pick up their first ever points with a second-place finish at the Belgian Grand Prix.
And Sutil, who steered the car to fourth place at Monza, is aiming even higher this season.
"My aim for this season is to be competitive throughout the season," he told the team's official website.
"We want to start strong and we want to end up strong.
"When (team owner) Vijay (Mallya) joined the team and bought the team that was the point where everything went in the right direction.
"Last year was the first real Force India year and it was already very successful.
"This winter was the best winter so far because the car could go through the development without any problems, the structures are clear in the team, so we are absolutely ready to race."
Sutil added: "I hope we will have a good season and I am pretty confident we will.
"We have had a good winter and a very good development programme so expectations are high.
"The car looks great, we did a positive step with the wind tunnel simulations but let's test and see where we are."
Regulation changes means the car is now significantly bigger, both in length and width, to accommodate the extra fuel following the decision to rule out in-race refuelling.
Design director Mark Smith believes Force India have still been able to retain the best features of last year's car.
"The VJM03 is definitely an evolution of the VJM02," he said. "In terms of the design philosophies that we've developed over the past year or two, we're quite happy with the direction that they're taking us so therefore we've opted to evolve the car."
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