Both Force India drivers recovered from racing incident to claim points finishes in Canada, with Tonio Liuzzi coming home ninth and Adrian Sutil tenth in an action-packed race.
Liuzzi started fifth, but had a run-in with Felipe Massa’s Ferrari out of the first corner, and was forced to pit for a new front wing. The Italian fought back with some good qualifying laps, and overtook Michael Schumacher in the closing stages of the race.
“It was a tough race and I drove every lap pushing so hard,” said Liuzzi. “The team deserved to get a good result after the hard work they have done this weekend and in the past weeks on the developments.
“We should ultimately have had more points than we got in the end, but it’s always OK to get another few points on board, particularly after the last race when they seemed so far away. Unfortunately we lost a big part of the race as the door was closed on me in the first corner by Felipe [Massa].
“It was a race accident as Jenson was on the other side and there wasn’t anything I could do – I was on the inside and holding my line. We lost the front wing and had to change the strategy then and there, but in the end we still got some points.
“The team is pushing like hell and we want to confirm the progress we’ve made with more results. Today showed we’re strongly in the top 10 and – more importantly – we will never give up.”
Adrian Sutil was battling with Robert Kubica for sixth place when the pair touched wheels. The German then had to pit with a right-rear puncture. However, he fought back from thirteenth and passed Michael Schumacher on the final lap to finish in the top ten.
“Like Tonio, it was a pretty hard race,” said Sutil. “At the start I was racing Kubica and it seemed we could have got into the top five again, but then we touched and I got a puncture. Unfortunately it was at the first corner so I had to drive the whole lap back to the pits.
“I lost a lot of time like this and dropped out of the top ten, and then had to fight my way past Hulkenberg and then Schumacher to get back in the points. At the end of the race we knew Michael had some problems with his tyres so I really pushed to close the gap and I just got past him on the last corner to get the final point.
“Of course I’m disappointed as I think we could have got some serious points here today but I think I drove well, the car was good and we were fast the whole race.”
Vijay Mallya knows that the team could have finished higher if it wasn’t for these incidents, but is pleased with another double-points finish and the overall pace shown by his two drivers this weekend: “Another double points finish for the team is a very positive result, but given our outstanding qualifying performance yesterday I think in my heart of hearts I would have hoped for more.
“Both drivers got caught in unfortunate accidents and dropped back but they drove excellently to salvage three points, which, given the circumstances of the race, is very good. We also picked up significant damage on both cars in the incidents and to still show that level of performance is very encouraging.
“What we have learnt this weekend is that we’ve got a very strong car that’s capable of fighting with the top four teams entirely on merit and we have two top line drivers who are functioning at their best. We’re really looking forward to Valencia now.”
