Spa: Sahara Force India scored 22 points in today’s Belgian Grand Prix as Nico Hulkenberg and Sergio Perez raced to fourth and fifth places, taking the team up to fourth place in the championship.

Meanwhile, Mercedes’ Nico Rosberg edged past Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo for the top position, while team-mate Lewis Hamilton came third after having started from the back row of the grid.

Nico Hülkenberg said that it was a massive result for the team and he was feeling very happy with fourth place. “There were some unusual circumstances, but we were there to take the opportunities and pick up some very important points. At the start of the race things worked out really well for me. The first lap was great; I was up in second place following Nico [Rosberg] and pulling away from the group of cars behind me. Unfortunately, the red flag proved costly because it neutralised things and bunched everybody back up again. The restart was clean and the rest of the race was quite controlled – just managing my pace and looking after the tyres. There was a battle with Fernando [Alonso] coming out of the pit lane, but we managed to stay ahead and keep the fourth position. Maybe if things had worked out slightly differently, we could have been on the podium, but I’m satisfied with the fourth position,” he said.

Meanwhile, Sergio Perez said, “It’s been a great day for the team and I am very pleased to finish fifth, but it was quite a tough race from the start. I chose a wide line going into turn one, but had to go far on the outside to avoid the first corner accident and that cost me a few positions. I dropped down to ninth and that compromised my race.”

“I managed to make some good progress early on, but every time I switched to new tyres I found myself having to put a lot of stress on them as I needed to attack Felipe [Massa] then Fernando [Alonso]. I still managed to make my way through and bring home a good result for the team. Moving to fourth in the constructors’’ championship is a fantastic achievement for us, but we can’t get carried away because there’s still a very long way to go in the season. Hopefully we can keep our momentum going and keep scoring strongly,” he added.