After two pointless races on Saturday, DAMS bounced back on Sunday as Marcus Armstrong got the teams’ first points on the board in the FIA Formula 2 feature race in Bahrain.
The New Zealander benefitted from a well-timed safety car to briefly led the race before he dropped back to fifth where he held off Jehan Daruvala in the Carlin and came home to score ten points for the French outfit.
Armstrong said: “The conditions were quite extreme here this weekend but we were fast, whatever the weather threw at us. We had very positive long run pace, especially on soft tyres. Unfortunately, during the second run in qualifying we underperformed so this put us out of position.
“In the first Sprint Race we had a technical problem, we were down on power from the beginning of the race and then eventually it just let go. In Sprint Race 2 we managed to charge through the field. It was looking very good until the late Safety Car allowed others to change tyres. A podium could have been possible but we didn’t have a new set of tyres to put on.
“Finally, in the Feature Race we had a good strategy, we came through the pack and we managed our soft tyres very well. The Safety Car came in one lap too early and I didn’t have any temperature in my tyres to attack hard, but the important thing is we took home some strong points.“
His teammate Roy Nissany had a tough weekend and it was compounded by contact with Robert Shwartzman which ended the Israeli’s feature race on lap one.
He said: “Not the weekend we expected. Our qualifying was compromised by not being able to record a decent lap on the first set of tyres and the session was difficult from there on with the red flag.
“Following that, we started from the midfield and tried to limit the damage by making up some places, eventually finishing just outside the top ten in Sprint Race 1.
“As for the Feature Race, I had a great start and then got hit from behind. It’s not an easy situation, there’s nothing we can do about it and we just have to accept it. I’m looking forward to our test in Barcelona, collecting some more data and moving on to the next round in Monaco. I’m sure we have great potential and we will show it very soon.”
