Renault Sport Formula One Team moved up the order in the Austrian Grand Prix with Jolyon Palmer finishing just shy of the points in twelfth after starting 20th and Kevin Magnussen finishing fourteenth after starting 17th. The positions gained were despite a mid-race safety car which was less than complimentary to the team’s tyre strategy and a five second penalty for Kevin for blocking a rival.
Kevin started the race from P17 with a new set of Pirelli’s red supersoft tyres. He changed to the yellow soft compound on lap 11, then a further set of new supersofts on lap 49 where he also served a five-second penalty.
Jolyon started the race in P20 on new supersoft tyres. He changed to new softs on lap 12 then new supersofts on lap 50.
Kevin Magnussen, #20, R.S.16-01: Started P17, finished P14
“The car felt good today and we made a reasonable first stint. Unfortunately the safety car didn’t work for us and after that we weren’t able to deliver the pace to get a stronger result. That said, both cars were there at the end which wasn’t the same for a few teams today. The five second penalty was fair enough as I did move more than once and you’re not allowed to do that; equally I didn’t know which way he was looking to try to pass and sometimes it’s difficult to make the right call. Now we’re looking forward to Silverstone, which is pretty much my home track.”
Jolyon Palmer, #30, R.S.16-02: Started P20, finished P12
“I’m quite happy with the race. We just needed that little bit of extra luck and we could have been right there within the points. The car was okay, it felt better than in the last round and this was probably one of my strongest races personally. Had we needed to change to soft tyres when the safety car came out, we might have been able to make a pit stop then get to the end on that set to score points. I’ve been feeling stronger and stronger over the last few races and knowing we could have done well today makes me hopeful for points at the next round at Silverstone.”
Fred Vasseur, Racing Director
“Our race pace wasn’t too bad and both drivers were able to deliver what was required today. We were a little unlucky with the safety car as we had opted to run a long middle stint on the soft tyres with both cars and shortly after we’d gone on to the soft Sebastian Vettel had his crash. We did struggle on the restart relative to cars on fresher tyres but we were able to make places at the end thanks to the retirements of others. We’re looking forward to heading to Enstone’s and Viry’s adopted home race in Silverstone.”
