Lewis Hamilton won on Sunday afternoon despite the soaked raceway, but the race is overshadowed by the accident of Jules Bianchi from the Marrussia team. Nico Rosberg and Sebastian Vettel completed the podium.
In their own words: INFINITI RED BULL RACING
SEBASTIAN VETTEL, Finish Position: 3rd, Start Position: 9th
“Everything that happened with the racing on track is secondary today, one of us is in a bad shape and we don’t yet know how he is. Jules had a bad accident and we hope to have some very good news, very soon. Not knowing what’s going on feels terrible, I think all the drivers really feel with him, as we know how difficult and slippery it was today; we hope for the very best.”
DANIEL RICCIARDO, Finish Position: 4th, Start Position: 6th
“Right now we’re all thinking about Bianchi and that’s the biggest concern for us. We heard he had a pretty big crash and it’s not nice when we don’t know if the driver is okay. The race was tricky, it wasn’t going too badly and the set-up we had for yesterday paid off. We tried a few different things with the strategy, but Bianchi is my main concern at the moment.”
CHRISTIAN HORNER, Team Principal: “First of all, irrelevant of anything else, our thoughts are with Jules Bianchi and that he’s okay; that is the absolute first priority.
“For the race, it was a strong race performance by the team with both drivers making great progress and some fantastic overtaking moves. Third and fourth are competitive results. We looked a lot more competitive in the wet conditions, which tend to be a great equaliser.”
THIERRY SALVI, Renault: “First and foremost, we are all thinking of Jules and hope for good news. For us, the race was a big challenge given the changing weather conditions. Seb and Dan were able to come back to the front with impressive overtaking throughout the race. The main task for the team was to manage the tyres based on forecast, lap time and driver comments. For us, it was a very busy race looking after the energy management of the power units with such changes in grip and track conditions.”
Williams Martini racing team Valtteri Bottas finish in fifth and Felipe Massa finish Seventh
Valtteri Bottas finished sixth and Felipe Massa seventh as the Japanese Grand Prix started, and ended, behind the safety car.
As the track conditions improved the race began but both drivers struggled on the intermediate tyres in tricky conditions.
The race ended early due to an accident involving Jules Bianchi, and the team’s thoughts and hopes are with him and the Marussia team.
Rob Smedley, Head of Performance Engineering: Our first concern is for the wellbeing of Jules, we hope that everything is ok. In the race we made some good strategy calls and as a result we extracted what we could and finished in a decent position. The conditions were difficult at the start and equally at the end as it got dark. However, our thoughts and hopes are with Jules, his family and friends, and the Marussia team.
Valtteri Bottas: It was not an easy race for us today, however we still got some points which is good. The car wasn’t great in the wet but we made the most of the strategy and extracted what we could. We are missing pace in the corners and so conceded a lot of time. It was a surprise to see the Red Bull so quick, in the dry we would have fared better. I really hope Jules is ok after the incident and that it is nothing serious.
Felipe Massa: The race was very difficult today, I suffered at the start with aquaplaning and towards the end it started to get dark as the rain fell again. The Red Bulls were too fast for us today, especially on the intermediate tyre, so there was no chance we could defend. My main focus at the moment is that Jules is ok though.
For full race Results: http://www.formula1.com/results/season/2014/931/
Photo credits: Redbull