Sun: Sauber, Force India, McLaren, Manor
McLaren fail to score points for the fifth race in row with Sauber performing the best of the teams outside the points…
Sauber:
Felipe Nasr: "It was a difficult race. We have been missing some lap time on medium as well as hard tyres compared to our main competitors. We still lack some downforce, which compromised our race. Our two stop strategy was overall a good choice. From my point of view, I took the maximum out of the car, so more than P12 was not possible."
Marcus Ericsson: "Overall, 14th is not satisfying, but I think we have extracted the maximum out of the car this weekend. I had a reasonable start, but afterwards for a few laps got stuck a bit in traffic. It is a shame that we lost some time, especially during my first pit stop. We need to make sure to make the next races, and I am confident we will do so. Now we need to focus on the test days and try to make sure we improve the car for the next races."
Force India:
Sergio Perez: "Considering where I qualified, we probably maximised our race today. Maybe a three-stop strategy would have been a little bit better, but it wouldn't have made much difference in the end. My last stint was really on the limit – nearly 30 laps on the same set of mediums – but we managed them well and I was able to control Ericsson who was putting pressure on me. Once again we showed today that our car is more suited to Sundays, so if we can improve our qualifying pace we can definitely fight for points at the next few races."
Nico Hulkenberg: "It was always going to be difficult to score points today, especially on a track where it’s so difficult to overtake. I was always stuck behind other cars and, even with better pace, you lose too much performance running in the dirty air. My three-stop race was the more aggressive approach, but we didn’t have the track position to make the most of it. Maybe things would have worked out better if I had run in some clean air, but points were too far away today. Hopefully we can be more competitive in Monaco. It’s often an unusual race and we will have completely different tyre compounds, which should suit us better."
McLaren:
Jenson Button: "My car was pretty scary to drive today: as soon as I touched the throttle, it just snapped away from me. It was unpredictable: in low-speed corners, the car was just slow, because I got wheel-spin immediately; in the high-speed stuff, it was just scary, because the rear end would snap away immediately under power. I was talking to my engineers for most of the race to try to find out what the root of the problem was, and we switched on quite a lot of handling balance changes to try to cure it. It got a little bit better towards the end of the afternoon, but it was a pretty tough afternoon. Now, we’ll thoroughly look at the data and see what the matter was – it’s something we’ve got to look into."
Fernando Alonso: "My pitstop was a scary moment – I didn’t have much rear braking for my whole in-lap, then even less at the stop. It was scary for the mechanics, but luckily it didn’t hurt anyone. My brake issue was separate from Jenson’s problem yesterday; in qualifying, he had a single disc that wasn’t reaching temperature, but I had no brakes. I think the rear disc stopped working, so I only had front brakes. Things are coming together. We’re still a long way off the front and need to take bigger steps, but this is a very challenging project and I’m happy that we’re recovering well. This has been a disappointing day, but the team will investigate what happened, and we’ll come back stronger in Monaco."
Manor:
Will Stevens: "It’s good to finish another race with both cars. From a set-up and car balance point of view, this was probably our best race yet, so a good result for the team. I didn’t get the best start and I was behind Roberto for the first 12 laps. After I passed him, I pushed as much as I could. I’m looking forward to Monaco now, which I think is a track that will suit our car a little more."
Roberto Merhi: "I’m pleased we achieved another two car finish for the team. The reliability of the car is obviously very good but we have to find some more performance. I got a good start and managed to get ahead of Will and stay there for 12 laps but we were on different tyre management strategies. On my second set of tyres I had a flat-spot and as that was a long stint I lost a lot of time. I’m happy to finish my first home race though and to have a good team result here in Spain."