Assessment: Williams suffers but earns a point

Hopes were high for Groove with drivers qualifying in 5th and 7th positions. But Williams’ lack of competitiveness was not hidden this time during the race held in dry conditions, and disrupted by failed starts.

Nico Hülkenberg can still congratulate himself for scoring his first point in the world championship by reaching 10th place at the end of the race, following Alonso’s retirement. Rubens Barrichello, on the other hand, saw his race ruined from the start by being stuck on his grid spot. With an alternate strategy and numerous retirements, he finished 12th.

Nico Hülkenberg – 10th:

We scored a point today, likely because our car was more reliable, that’s racing. It was a difficult race because we didn’t have good pace at the right time. I hoped we would do better, but we have work to do to improve.

Rubens Barrichello – 12th:

I don’t know what happened at the start, I will look into it with the team. From then on, I was relegated to the back of the pack. We tried a different strategy to climb back up, but our car wasn’t competitive. We lost a great opportunity today.

Sam Michaels – Technical Director:

« We had a difficult race this afternoon from which we come away with one point. Both drivers had difficulties at the start, Rubens didn’t get away, and Nico had excessive wheel spin. We opted to pit Rubens very early and sent him back out on hard tires because he was caught in traffic. Nico also had to pit early because we had an electronic issue with his steering wheel that was indicating a need to change the engine map. We remain focused on improving our pace and our starts. »