Report Saturday: Force India: Sutil and Di Resta will aim for points tomorrow

Force India knew that the fight with Williams would tighten this year, but did not expect that both teams would tumble towards the bottom of the standings. But a positive note: Paul di Resta is the only rookie to have regularly outperformed his teammate during qualifying.

Paul Di Resta 14th position 1’26’739

« I think if we had been told that we would start from 14th place before qualifying, we would have been happy. So for my first qualifying session, I think we can be pleased with our results today, which give me a foundation for the future. I would like to thank the whole team for their efforts and I am really looking forward to tomorrow’s race. »

Adrian Sutil 16th position 1’31’407

« During qualifying, our speed was good and better than expected. On my flying lap in Q2, I was about a hundred meters from the finish line when I hit the curb, lost control, and spun. It’s a shame because I was on a 1’26 lap and could have been around twelfth place. It’s pretty good for tomorrow’s race, we will surely have overtaking opportunities with the DRS [drag reduction system] and KERS, so we’ll see what happens. »

Otmar Szafnauer

« Today’s classification is in line with our results during the free practice sessions and gave us some additional information regarding the Pirelli tires. We paid close attention to our tire choice, as we believe the strategy will have a major impact on performance across the grid tomorrow. Even though it would have been preferable to qualify higher on the grid, we are aiming for points. »