Ericsson: Painful to yield P10 to Wehrlein

Editor

Marcus Ericsson says it was “painful” to watch Pascal Wehrlein score in Baku, especially when he was running P10 after Ericsson has yielded the position to him.

Concerned that Stoffel Vandoorne could catch them in the closing laps of Sunday’s Azerbaijan GP, Sauber ordered Ericsson to move over for Wehrlein as the German was showing better pace.

Wehrlein brought his C35 home in tenth place while Ericsson was two seconds behind in P11.

Outside the top-ten it means Ericsson has not scored a single point since the 2015 Italian GP.

“It was difficult to give it up because it has been a long time since I scored points, so it was hurting to let that position by but the team was giving me the order and I had to listen to them,” Ericsson told ESPN.

“After I let him past I kept up the pace with him, I think I was like two seconds behind or something, just covered him from Vandoorne to help the team get points.

“It’s good for the team to be in the points again but it’s a bit painful for me not to be scoring them.

“We had a tough fight but after I kept positions it was good. I thought it was kind of over and I was going to pull away and then I got the call to let him switch positions to cover Vandoorne, so I had to listen to that.

“It was a shame because I thought I could have kept my place.”

The 26-year-old’s disappointment was compounded by his belief that Vandoorne would have never been able to pass both Saubers to grab tenth.

“The team obviously wants to be on the safe side and they thought this was more safe, but like I said I’m pretty sure there’s no way Vandoorne would have overtook Pascal and me if we had kept positions. I’m pretty sure of that. But I’m a team player and I respect the team. Sometimes it hurts because you don’t agree.”