Sainz ‘very pleased’ with overtaking fest to P8

Carlos Sainz declares himself “very pleased” with his Austrian Grand Prix performance, which saw the Toro Rosso ace recover from a lowly starting position to eighth thanks to many overtaking moves.

Sainz endured a tough qualifying session when an engine issue left him 15th on the grid. The Spaniard quickly moved up into the points-paying positions only to fall back down the order as the race was neutralised following Sebastian Vettel’s tyre failure.

Despite spending the entire second half of the 71-lap race on the same set of tyres, Sainz scythed through the field to claim his sixth points finish in nine races this year.

“I’m very pleased with my race, especially because we didn’t have an easy one!” the 21-year-old said. “We started from the back and did a good start, managing to get into the top 10 in the early stages of the race.

“Suddenly, after the second pit-stop during the Safety Car period, we were nearly last… Which meant we had to do a very good last stint on the Soft tyres – 35 laps – overtaking lots of cars and managing to get back into the top eight, something a bit unexpected after seeing myself back in P15 with half the race to go.”

Sainz was also quick to praise Toro Rosso’s efforts after the team managed to fit another power unit into his car overnight.

“After a tough Saturday, I’m happy to finish the weekend with a good result as we’ve worked very hard for this – now we just need to make sure we have better Saturdays in order to start races further up the grid and fight for more points.

“I’m confident we can do it and I look forward to next week’s race weekend in Silverstone – my favorite track together with Spa – where we will keep pushing!”

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