F1: Points optimistic Maldonado

Thursday, July 28, 2011, 16: 11 GMT

Pastor Maldonado is confident that the similarities between the Hungaroring and Monaco - where he was denied a possible top six finish to be pushed to the wall by Lewis Hamilton - could help scoring his maiden formula 1 points this weekend.

The Venezuelan, who won the GP2 feature race at the Hungaroring circuit last year and also claimed victory in a race in Euroseries 3000 in 2007, believes that the characteristics of the track could allow him to fight for the superior position in the midfield, which has in recent races.

As well as a track dominated by slow corners, Pirelli has allocated the compounds of soft and supersoft tyres that were used in Monaco. This means that despite Hungaroring do not require the same precision of conduction between the barriers, there are many features in common with the track where Maldonado starred in two months ago.

"It is not exactly the same, but in terms of setting Hungary is very close to Monaco," said Maldonado when AUTOSPORT he asked if he thought he could recover his form of Monaco in Hungary.

"The trail is very rugged and is very hard mentally and physically, as that side of things, is very similar to Monaco." The supersoft and soft shooting should work better with our car. "So I hope to close the gap a bit more [facing] than in previous races on normal tracks."

Maldonado has shown impressive form of Saturday until this season, outqualifying his much more experienced teammate Rubens Barrichello five times in 10 races. But in the team to improve the performance of his car in race trim, the tyre degradation has called a special weakness.

His best finish of the race this year has been day 14, which stated in the circuit of Nürburgring and Silverstone, but he has qualified in the top 10 three times, which shows that the struggles of car in long races.

"The car is a little more competitive in the standings than during the race, said Maldonado. "We are working to improve on that." If we can be more consistent during the race, will give engineers strategically more opportunities. Our strategies in racing can be very limited because we have to work with the tyres. "We have been making progress on this, but not enough."

"Wear and tear of tyres is one of the most important things during the race on Sunday, it will be a difficult weekend for everyone." "We have to manage this situation very well."