Force India leaves Francorchamps with 6 points
After a difficult qualifying session yesterday, Force India bounced back strongly this afternoon as Adrian Sutil raced to seventh place in the Belgian Grand Prix, earning the team a further six championship points. Paul Di Resta sustained damage to his car in a first corner incident and just missed out on points as he finished P11.
P7 Adrian Sutil, VJM04/04
Tyre strategy: New soft, new soft, new medium
“After starting P15 we have to be very happy with our seventh place today. It was an exciting race with lots of action, but we had a good strategy and made the right calls at the right time. When the safety car came out I pitted straight away, which helped me because I made up a couple of places. I came out in sixth and after that I only lost one position to Schumacher, who was on the soft tyre and faster than me. Overall I think that this result is a fair reflection of the pace we have had this weekend and it’s nice to have recovered from the problems we had yesterday to leave here with these important points.”
P11 Paul Di Resta, VJM04/02
Tyre strategy: New soft, new soft, new medium
“I got off the line very well and everything seemed to be going quite smoothly. But there was an incident ahead of me and I thought I had managed to get through the corner when I got hit hard by Timo [Glock]. That put a big whole in the floor, damaged my front wing and gave me a lot of understeer. Other than that the pace of the car was quite strong, but I was a bit unlucky with the safety car because the priority had to go to the leading car [Adrian] and I dropped behind the Williams. Without that I could have probably been ahead of Maldonado. It’s good that Adrian was able to score some points and we’ve demonstrated the pace of the car once again.”
Dr. Vijay Mallya, Chairman and Team Principal: “Considering the problems we had yesterday, I am very happy that we have managed to come away from Spa with six points to strengthen our position in the constructors’ championship. It was a typical Spa race; very exciting and Adrian drove well to come through the pack and finish seventh. It was a great team performance and the strategy was spot on. I feel sorry that Paul was unable to join him in the points because he was unlucky today. The damage he picked up on the opening lap affected the balance of the car and then he lost out with the timing of the safety car. Even so, we leave here in high spirits and I’m confident we can continue this form in Monza in a couple of weeks’ time.”
