Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg and Sergio Perez were left disappointed after both retiring from the Austrian Grand Prix at the Red Bull Ring.
Hulkenberg lined up on the front row of the grid but he lost ground at the start and soon fell down the order, struggling with tyre graining.
His VJM09 picked up a vibration late in the race and brake wear levels were also at critical levels, with Force India opting to retire his car.
“I’m pretty disappointed and gutted, to be honest,” Hulkenberg said. “It was a really tough race and nothing really worked out for us.
“The start wasn’t great and I dropped a couple of positions on lap one, but the opening stint was very difficult because the car was sliding around and the tyres were graining.
“That became the story of my race because the balance of the car wasn’t allowing me to manage the tyres and I was suffering with so much graining.
“With a new set I could manage just three of four laps before they fell away. Towards the end of the race I had some vibrations with the car and the team saw that I was critical on brake wear, which is why we retired the car in the end.”
Perez was running in the top 10 but brake issues on the final lap caused him to go straight on and into the wall at Turn 3: “It’s a big shame that we retired on the last lap of the race. I’m feeling sad for the team because we really deserved some points.
“We have been really unlucky, and it’s frustrating because we’ve been competitive here with our pace. The race was going really well and I thought we had the points in our pocket.
“I was pushing hard to stay close to [Romain] Grosjean because I knew he had a five seconds time penalty. Then, on the final lap, going into Turn 3, I had no brakes and went straight on.
“I touched the barrier and damaged the front of the car, but I’m perfectly okay. It’s annoying because the team did everything right and it’s just bad luck which stopped our great recovery.”
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