Toro Rosso gleaned some satisfaction from today’s Brazilian Grand Prix despite leaving Interlagos without any points to show for their efforts.
Jaime Alguersuari finished just outside the points in eleventh but was pleased about the gains he made in the race, rather than the points that he may have missed out on. “I think we can be quite satisfied with today's performance as I never expected to finish as high as eleventh in the dry conditions, as we lacked some top line speed,” the Spaniard commented. “All the same, I had some good battles.
“With no retirements ahead of us, finishing three places higher than I started is the best we could have expected. Now I am looking forward to our last race of the season in Abu Dhabi and we only have a few days to wait, which is nice!”
Sebastian Buemi started the race in nineteenth thanks to a five-place grid penalty awarded in Korea. The Swiss driver finished fourteenth and, like his teammate, thought the race actually went rather well. “You can never be really happy with a thirteenth place finish, but all the same I think we did a reasonably good job today,” said Buemi.“I made a super start and got past three cars. Then on the second lap I also managed to get by Kobayashi.
“I think I ran at a good pace and I managed to fight off the guys coming up behind me. Towards the end on a one stop strategy, my tyres were very worn, so I was pleased I was still able to defend my position. Not a bad afternoon.”
Franz Tost, the Toro Rosso team principal, agreed that the team had a good race, and just had a tricky mountain to after qualifying where they did: “We started from fourteenth and nineteenth and finished eleventh and thirteenth and when the entire field bar one car finishes the race, it is hard to score points, so we can take some satisfaction from finishing in front of most our direct rivals today which is good.
“We were eleventh for most of the race and when the Safety Car appeared, we decided to leave both our cars out on track, giving the drivers the task of defending position against some runners on newer tyres. Jaime and Sebastien did a good job in the closing stages therefore, as indeed they did for the whole 71 laps.
“Congratulations to Red Bull Racing for winning the Constructors' title.”
