Sunday: Both McLaren drivers score points

Jenson Button – 7th:

« It was a fun race, even though it seemed like I was a target for other cars! Sebastian [Vettel] tried several times to overtake me and hit my rear wheel in the second corner. He might have damaged his wing but I was lucky not to get a puncture. With Romain [Grosjean], I don’t know what he was thinking: besides going into the grass, it was inevitable that we would touch! I don’t think he was thinking at that moment.

I did almost half the race on mediums, which is more than anyone else. It was good to be able to show that we can do it. Our stint on softs was also very good, and I had an excellent first lap, jumping from 13th to 8th place. We beat a Ferrari without question, and we would have beaten a Mercedes if Nico [Rosberg] hadn’t retired. So we have a lot of positives to take from here.

7th place may seem unexciting, especially after fighting for 5th place in the last race, but we did a good job this weekend and made a step forward. It’s a nice little boost as we send everyone off for the summer holidays.

Sergio Perez – 9th:

« We really needed the tires at the start to be in the best possible condition to properly execute our two-stop strategy. After yesterday’s qualifying, I think we were in a good position to score good points, but we were affected by the stint with the worn softs used in qualifying. So we lost a bit too much time during the first stint. I struggled with the rear of the car and had to pit earlier than expected, which put me back in traffic and made me lose even more time. It’s really a shame.

Nevertheless, there is something positive about scoring points again with both cars. I think we can be happy with our work in the last few races, an encouraging result for everyone and it’s a nice gift before the August break.