A good race in the end: P10 to P7, so I’m pretty happy. It was a tricky start – I don’t know what happened at the end of the back straight, there was some water or a bit of oil on track or something and I completely lost the rear. It put me down a few positions more than I wanted and set me back – but the rest of the race was really good. I controlled my pace when I had to, knowing that the Racing Points and Renaults were quick when we had a similar tyre life. I knew I might’ve been able to overtake and that’s what I did. I felt the car came on strong – it got better and better towards the end of the race and we managed to push forward a bit with some good pace. One more lap and I could’ve done something to get P6, but I’m still happy with P7.

I’m extremely disappointed not to race for a second-consecutive year here in Belgium. Having started from P7 and seeing how the race unfolded, we definitely missed a very strong chance to score big points and get a good result. So, I’m very far from happy. It’s the second engine with issues this year and the frustration of losing points again is very tough. I strongly feel this is not the season we deserve so far. However, we’ll put it behind us and switch our focus to Monza tomorrow. We move on.

It was damage-limitation today. Despite having a good race car here, we could only score six points. Carlos’ race was over before it began with a PU failure on his reconnaissance laps-to-grid, which forced us to retire the car before the start. Lando unfortunately lost two positions during the first lap, which compromised his race. On a positive note, Lando drove a great race to fight his way back up to P7, and that result lifts us back up to P3 in the Constructors’ Championship, taking points away from both Racing Point and Ferrari. The team in the garage and back at the MTC did an excellent job to stay focussed after the big disappointment with Carlos and executed Lando’s race perfectly, including a very good pit-stop. Tomorrow we reset and prepare for the Italian Grand Prix. We’ve seen here that we can compete on the low-downforce tracks, which should put us in a good position for a fight with our closest rivals at Monza.