Romain Grosjean was one of the stars of the final part of the German Grand Prix on Sunday, with the Frenchman climbing from eleventh, after an ill-judged pit stop for Intermediate tyres, to finish sixth at the Hockenheimring.
The Haas F1 Team racer had to fight through the pack, passing Brendon Hartley, Marcus Ericsson, Carlos Sainz Jr., Esteban Ocon and Sergio Pérez in the final laps, with the pass on the Mexican for sixth coming on the very last lap.
It was only Grosjean’s second top ten finish of the season after his fourth place finish in the Austrian Grand Prix, and he felt that he needed to give the team a good result to make up for mistakes he’s made during the season that has cost them points.
“That was good fun,” said Grosjean. “It was a good end to the race. Obviously, we didn’t quite get the right choice putting inters on, as the track dried really quickly for some reason.
“It was a bit of luck, a gamble, but we came back on slicks, and I had amazing fun through those last laps. I was just pushing it to the limit and going for it. I think we would’ve been quite happy to be where we were before the rain came, and then, obviously, it rained.
“The boys deserved a really good drive from me, and I had fun doing it.”
Team-mate Kevin Magnussen was less fortunate as he found himself outside the points despite running inside the top six for a good spell of the race. Like Grosjean, the Dane pitted for Intermediates but unlike his team-mate was unable to climb through the field in the closing laps when back on slicks, finishing on the road in twelfth before being promoted to eleventh thanks to a penalty for Sainz.
“Obviously, it wasn’t ideal to end up outside of the points after being P6 for the whole race,” said Magnussen. “We didn’t quite get the best out of the weather situation.
“We’ll just have to learn from that and do better next time.”
