Force India convert single stop strategy to double points finish
Sahara Force India scored nine world championship points today as Paul Di Resta and Adrian Sutil finished in sixth and tenth places respectively in the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.
Paul Di Resta, 6th, VJM06-04: “It’s a great feeling to finish sixth and make the one-stop strategy work. I said yesterday that we had opted to set the car up more for the race and it really paid off today. There were times when we had to be very quick and times when we had to manage the pace and look after the tyres. Towards the end of the race I was battling with Fernando and Lewis, but it was impossible to hold Fernando back because he was on much fresher soft tyres. Lewis was on the mediums so I just focussed on getting clean exits from the hairpin and the chicane leading onto the long straights, and was able to stay ahead. The eight points are just what we needed and everybody in the team deserves credit for the big effort that has gone in this week. That’s two strong weekends in a row and we will move to Austin determined to keep up the momentum.”
Adrian Sutil, 10th, VJM06-03: “Considering that I started in P17 I have to be quite satisfied about scoring a point and I’m happy about the team result today. It’s not been an easy weekend with the problems I had during practice and qualifying, but the strategy today was the right one and we came away with a point. I was running in ninth until the last lap ahead of Perez, but by that time I had done 27 laps on the soft tyres and it was very hard to defend because I had no traction out of the slow speed corners. The points scored in the last two races have been very important for the championship position.”
Robert Fernley, Deputy Team Principal: “The whole team can feel very proud of today’s result, which sets us up nicely for the final couple of races. With nine points in the bag the sixth place in the championship is looking much more realistic and we are only 18 points away from fifth place. Despite the limited practice mileage on Friday we felt confident of pulling off the one-stop strategy, just as we did in India last weekend. Paul and Adrian drove faultless races, looked after their tyres when they needed to and showed very strong pace throughout. It’s rewarding to see the progress we have made in the last couple of races, which is a result of all the hard work behind the scenes. We’ve kept our heads down, worked hard and it is starting to show. We now look forward to Austin with optimism and hope to build on the performance of the last two races.”
