From the cockpit: Felipe Nasr on Sauber's Chinese GP

Now in his second season racing for Sauber, Felipe Nasr will continue to write exclusively for F1i to provide insight in to the life of an F1 driver.

The facts and the truth

The facts about the Chinese Grand Prix you will all know by now: the first lap misunderstanding that happened way up front in the field (from my perspective, anyway) between Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen caused a ripple effect that culminated with me trying to avoid someone in front and clashing with Lewis Hamilton.

My race was spoiled from scratch, but the team and I soldiered on trying to understand our car’s behaviour in all the combinations between fuel load and types of tyres. It is the only opportunity we have to test, taking into account the way that the rules are, and one can never let such a chance pass you by.

So the guys are back at Hinwil trying to extract the truth from all the data we gathered and find a way to put us back on the good track, similar to the situation we were enjoying this time last year.

This is the reality of motor racing, always with its ups and downs that contribute to its fascination. I do understand this natural pattern of our trade and as a result it helps me keep my confidence in the team and our capacity to find solutions that will put us back in the hunt for points.

One of the more encouraging aspects of what we have seen at the start of this season is that we have newer and fiercer competitors fighting for the same spots in an exciting battle that keeps reminding us why we chose this sport.

I will also be with the team back in Switzerland this week and have all the confidence that the C35 will prove to be everything that it was designed for and that it briefly started to show in the Barcelona tests before the first GP. The funny thing about the evidence though is that when it is still connected to the opinions and interpretations phase it can give way to many misleading roads which are easy to follow.

The next grand prix in Russia is on a completely different type of circuit and if we manage to find out what the truth is with the car then I am more than sure that the facts will be a lot better.

We are all pushing hard to come back to you here next week and tell you how much progress we have managed to make. Hopefully you will have witnessed it for yourselves by then.

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Technical analysis - Shanghai

Scene at the Chinese Grand Prix