Nico Rosberg put in an entertaining and aggressive drive in today's Grand Prix of Bahrain, and one which should have brought the Mercedes driver a second place finish but for a brake-by-wire issue two laps from the end.
The German appeared well inspired all evening, stepping up the level of his driving this weekend, and getting the upper hand over the Ferraris after a poor start, but still falling short of being able to challenge his team mate Lewis Hamilton.
"I really like the car today and told the guys right after the start that it really felt good. So I went for it, and I had to of course because I was fourth and had to get past the red cars to try to chase down Lewis. Tried my best but in spite of a similar pace, it just wasn't possible."I
Rosberg was adamant that without the brake issue which unexpectedly appeared at the very tail end of the race he would have kept Räikkonen's Ferrari at bay.
"It was disappointing to lose second place two laps from the end but the pedal just went straight down without any resistance," commented the German. "Without that problem I could have held Kimi off for sure because his tyres were quite destroyed at that point. Other than that it was quite an enjoyable race, and very exciting in the beginning to be able to pass the red cars which gave me particular pleasure."
Click here for analysis of the development war between Ferrari and Mercedes
Keep up to date with all the F1 news via Facebook and Twitter