Grosjean: P7 was possible without qualifying blow-up

Romain Grosjean believes that a seventh-placed finish was on the cards for Haas had it not been for a spectacular engine failure at the beginning of Q1 on Saturday. The Frenchman didn't get to take part in qualifying and started from the back of the grid instead.

Despite the issue, Grosjean went on to beat his teammate in the race and finish in 12th place, with a performance he was happy with afterward.

"We didn’t really know quite how long we could go," he said.

We had been planning to go long, but not as long as that. The tires were holding quite nicely. There was only a bit of front degradation.

"I was happy with the pace. I was easily managing keeping up with the Renault in front and the Force India behind. If qualifying had been as I was expecting with a P7, it would’ve been a P7, for sure.

"Anyway, we tried to come back, but our strategy didn’t quite work. When we came out of the pit we had a lot of blue flags and so on. I couldn’t really come back through the field.

"We did our best. The car is fast and I enjoyed driving it.”