Baku a perfect, special race for Rosberg

Nico Rosberg described his drive in today's Grand Prix of Europe as one of those rare moments when everything went right and where he had felt at one with his race car.

"It's been an amazing day really, an amazing weekend," he said after securing a dominant victory in Formula One's first race at Baku.

"Everything went really well, from the beginning to the end, and even in the race it was special for me out there in the car. The car would do whatever I wanted and the thing would just stick to the ground and there was no risk of making a mistake.

"Today was special out there because I felt one with my car and that doesn't happen often that everything is just perfect and I can push all the way and there's no risk of making an error or even a lockup or things like that.

"So it was a great feeling and that's what made it best actually."

He added that while it might have looked trouble-free from the outside, there was no such thing as an easy win at this level of motorsport. "It's always tough to win a Formula One race."

Indeed, Rosberg was briefly troubled by the same engine setting glitch as the one suffered by his team mate Lewis Hamilton, but in Rosberg's case it proved straightforward to resolve.

"We both had a performance power issue out there and it was pretty clear at the time but the problem is that with the radio clampdown they can't tell us what it is exactly, they're just allowed to tell us there is an issue in this mode. What mode who knows, you know?

"The problem I knew what it was so I just took the most likely switch and turned I switched if off and it then it was working fine so that was it."

Unlike other drivers in Baku this weekend, Rosberg didn't object to the extra pressure of not being able to receive detailed help messages from the pit wall.

"It makes it a lot more challenging and we're a much more on our own out there. I do put a lot of effort into that side. Whether it now helped in this specific case not necessarily. But still it's an area, it's a new challenge you know that makes it different and which causes these sort of difficulties in the race so from that it's a good thing I guess."

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.