Finishing second here in Paul Ricard is better than we expected coming into the weekend. As soon as we got to Turn 2 I was relieved not to have had contact, so from there it was just about managing my own race, which was fairly straightforward. I could see Lewis managing the pace but we were still not far off without pushing the car too much. I think we got the strategy spot on. The soft tyres felt a little bit more robust and allowed me to find some good pace to make the final laps more comfortable. After two clean races and good result in a row it’s important to carry this momentum forward. We have had a third and now a second so with the right track I am looking forward to a victory. I missed a good chance in Monaco but there are still some good opportunities coming up, but to score good points for the team at circuits that are not ideal for us is a big positive. It was nice to race here in France, to hear the national anthem and see so many people in the grandstands made it feel like a traditional European grand prix.

I’m obviously a bit disappointed and it’s a shame to lose out on the podium today. We were definitely quicker than fourth place and it could have been a good battle with Max. I don’t know why yet but the front wing was damaged during the race. Before the pit stop we had really good pace on the supersofts, I don’t know how good compared to Lewis as he was so quick, but it seemed that we were pulling away from Kimi and catching Max. Then about two laps before I stopped I had damage to the left part of the front wing; I felt some understeer immediately and I don’t know whether it was a failure or I hit some debris but the mechanics could see it during the stop. After the stop, the identical part on the right of the front wing also broke. Because of the damage we had less downforce, the car was understeering, and the tyres were suffering. Kimi was always going to catch us at the end of the race with that pace, the blue flags were also pretty bad, but we were a wounded car. It was a shame as we looked quite strong today. The positive is that we got some decent points but we were definitely quicker than fourth and just unlucky this afternoon.

In the end an entertaining grand prix and we are happy to come away from our first run at Paul Ricard with a good haul of points for the team and a podium. Max had a good strong drive to complete a very good weekend finishing in second place and achieving back to back to podiums following on from a third place in Canada. From the start he managed to avoid the collision between Sebastian and Valtteri at Turn 1 and then settle into second place with a good clean race from there. It was a shame for Daniel whose car was stricken around the mid-point in the race when the top two elements of his front flap became disbanded, possibly through hitting some debris. A very frustrating race for him as he also looked good for a podium place. In summary, the French Grand Prix represents a solid start to the triple-header and we go directly to our home race in Austria where we hope we can be as competitive there and take the fight to the leaders at the Red Bull Ring.