George Russell was left disappointed after a solid Austrian Grand Prix weekend turned sour on Sunday.
The Williams driver appeared able to fight with the lower midfield teams throughout practice and qualifying, and in fact, only missed out of Q2 by less than a tenth of a second on Saturday.
However, it was a slightly different situation on race day as Russell slipped back and was ultimately a casualty of Mercedes’ iffy reliability, retiring from P12.
“We didn’t have as much pace as we were hoping for today, and I struggled a lot out there,” he said.
“I was trying my hardest to hang on with the Haas and the Alfa Romeo, but they were too fast.
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“I had a fuel pressure loss, but I don’t know all the details, I just had to turn the car off,” Russell added, explaining his stoppage.
“It’s a shame as there were a lot of mistakes made out there today and many cars stopped. It is just one of those things.
“We still need to make some improvements, and we have the opportunity next week to do that.”
Teammate Nicholas Latifi was the odd-one-out as he was the only finisher not to score a point in P11 and admits he has work to do to catch the rest of the field.
“Today was all about learning for me,” said the Canadian. “We struggled early on in the race with some cooling issues so I couldn’t push as hard as I wanted to.
“It was about managing a bunch of things, but that is part of Formula 1, it can happen.
“We got caught out by the first safety car, by staying out an extra lap.
“Most of the race was unfortunately done by myself, so it was nice that the safety car came out at the end so I could experience running close to the other cars.
“I am frustrated that I was so close to getting a point, but it is a learning experience and I will come back stronger next weekend.”