Despite missing out on points and having run as high as seventh in the early stages of the Belgian Grand Prix, Jolyon Palmer felt it was a better than expected weekend for the Renault Sport F1 team.
Having started thirteenth at Spa-Francorchamps, Palmer avoided much of the chaos at the start to run inside the top ten, but dropped away as the faster drivers came through, and high tyre degradation also affected his afternoon as he finished fifteenth on Sunday.
“We had our best qualifying here,” said Palmer. “Both cars had a great start and ran in the top ten for a while. We could have had a strong race but the safety car pulled a lot of people back into play.
“It’s a shame not to get better results in the end but this weekend has been better than we expected overall.”
Palmer revealed that he saw the crash for team-mate Kevin Magnussen in his mirrors, and was grateful for the news that he was okay following the huge accident at Raidillon.
“I saw Kevin crash in my rear mirrors,” said Palmer of his team-mates crash. “It’s not nice to see because it’s a really, really fast part of the track. I’m glad he’s ok.”
