Sunday: A decisive first round for Toro Rosso
While Jean-Eric Vergne was forced to make an early stop to change the front wing after colliding with Michael Schumacher at the start, Daniel Ricciardo finished the race behind Paul di Resta and Bruno Senna, with whom he had battled in the first lap before losing ground due to his Hard tires.
Daniel Ricciardo – 13th:
« It was a rather eventful first lap. I was on the dirty side of the grid but, to be honest, I had the best possible start and overtook Schumacher who had an issue after the first corner. It was a bit chaotic at turn 4, and we were three abreast with di Resta and Senna approaching turn 5, but I was on the outside and had to lift off. After that, I tried to push hard during my first stint, but I wasn’t getting a good feel with the Hard tires and was a bit off my pace.
After making my only stop to fit the Soft tires, the car felt much better, I was able to find my rhythm and kept pushing repeatedly. But it wasn’t enough to catch di Resta, and towards the end of the race I had to defend against Kobayashi. So, it wasn’t exactly an exciting race, but we can try again in a week [in Abu Dhabi].
Jean-Eric Vergne – 15th:
As soon as the lights went out, I got sandwiched and had to brake harder and earlier than I wanted to. This means I locked my wheels and hit the back of Schumacher’s car. It broke my front wing, so I had to go through the pits and my race was more or less over after that. I kept pushing as hard as I could, trying to make good lap times, but my car’s performance wasn’t that good this weekend.
In a sense, it’s a race to forget, but on the other hand, we need to see what we can learn from it so that we arrive in better shape in Abu Dhabi. We’ve already seen that, even if there’s only one week between two races, it doesn’t mean the performance will be the same, so we can be optimistic for the next race.
