British GP: Race notes - Sauber

05/07/2015
NEWS STORY

A very unfortunate British Grand Prix for the Sauber F1 Team. Marcus Ericsson put in a flawless performance until the weather came into play. The Swede lost a lot of time due to numerous pit stops and, therefore, finished 11th. The Sauber C34-Ferrari of Felipe Nasr had issues on the way to the starting grid. The team identified a mechanical issue with the gear box. Because of this, the Brazilian was not able to participate in the race.

Marcus Ericsson: "It is disappointing to miss out on points when we had it in the bag for quite a long time. The first half of the race was reasonable. I had a good start, gaining some positions on lap one. My pace was good, so I was able to keep up with our direct competitors. It was one of those days when it was difficult to make predictions, as it started to rain on some parts of the track and others were still dry. It was not an easy situation, either for the drivers or for the team. Unfortunately, we made too many pit stops today. We need to sit down and analayse what we could have done differently."

Felipe Nasr: "An unlucky day for me. When I went out to the starting grid I got stuck in sixth gear. As soon as I returned to the garage the team detected a mechanical issue with the gearbox. It is a shame. Looking at the number of cars that retired, this was a race in which I could have taken advantage of some situations. Now we have to look forward and focus on the next race weekend in Budapest."

Monisha Kaltenborn, Team Principal: "A very unfortunate race in which many things went wrong. Felipe was not able to race due to a mechanical issue with the gearbox. Marcus put in a strong performance until the weather conditions changed. Afterwards it is clear that we changed too early onto intermediate tyres. As the rain that was predicted didn't come as much as it was expected, his intermediate tyres lost grip and, therefore, he lost lap time. Then it seemed that we were able to close the gap in the next two to three laps due to what we expected to be a dry period. That's why we changed to slicks. If we had waited for one more lap, this wouldn't have happened."

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Published: 05/07/2015
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