Sahara Force India
Nico Hulkenberg believes he "paid for the mistake" he made during qualifying as he finished in ninth place at the European Grand Prix.
Hulkenberg spun in Q2 and started the race from 12th position, before recovering to ninth place, despite being struck by Haas' Esteban Gutierrez on the first lap.
With Hulkenberg's Force India team-mate Sergio Perez finishing on the podium, the German was left to rue his Saturday mistake.
"It was a fairly tough race for me," said Hulkenberg.
"The start was ok, but coming into Turn 1 someone [Gutierrez] hit me from behind. I lost a couple of positions trying to control the car and that put me a bit on the back foot.
"Getting through traffic in the opening stages was not very easy and it cost me a lot of time.
"Then, for the early part of the race, I was struggling with oversteer and in general I couldn’t find the same harmony with the car that I had in practice.
"The car had great potential all weekend long, but I feel I paid for the mistake I made in qualifying."
