P10 Sergio Perez Chassis 02
Strategy: New SuperSoft (39 laps) – New Soft (31 laps)
Sergio: “I was really hoping we could get some rain this afternoon. Throughout the race I was looking at the clouds and they were getting darker, but in the end it stayed dry. I don’t think we had the race pace to score more points today. I had to fuel save quite early on and for much of the afternoon it was a pretty lonely race for me. We made our strategy work as best as we could and tenth place was as much as we could achieve. It’s a shame we couldn’t score more and capitalise on the Renaults not scoring, but hopefully we can end the season with a better result in Abu Dhabi.”
P15 Esteban Ocon Chassis 03
Strategy: New Soft (40 laps) – New SuperSoft (30 laps)
Esteban: “It’s disappointing not to score when we had good pace. I had made some good overtakes throughout the race, but it all came to nothing after the contact with Max [Verstappen]. He came out of the pits, I stayed behind him for nearly two laps but I was much faster than him and the team advised me to unlap myself. I went on the outside at turn one – the same move I made on Fernando [Alonso] and on many others before, but Max didn’t give me any space. Once I was beside him I couldn’t just disappear, so we collided. But it was my corner and I had the right to the space. I was saddened by his behaviour after the race: he was very aggressive and the guys from the FIA had to intervene. That’s not the way to handle these things.”
Otmar Szafnauer, Team Principal & CEO
“Rescuing one point was realistically the only result we could achieve given our difficult Saturday. Sergio completed a good race, fighting against the Renaults in the opening stages and opening a gap. It was a fairly lonely race after that, because we couldn’t close the gap on the two Haas cars in front, but given the circumstances it was a good result. Esteban had done a good job making up ground from the back of the grid and would have probably finished in P11 if it hadn’t been for the clash with Verstappen. The rules state that you’re allowed to unlap yourself and Esteban was much faster than Max at that stage. Unfortunately he wasn’t left any space in the corner and that ruined the race for both.”
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