It took him three attempts, but in the final laps Magnussen managed to finally overtake Tsunoda, after his undercut attempt was fumbled by the safety car. But the Dane clawed himself back into contention and with a big lunge which saw both drivers lock-up their brakes he managed to secure the final points scoring place.
“I’m really happy. […] We got a point. A really great job by the team. I think we really turned things around this weekend. We didn’t start the weekend too good. But we managed to turn it around and find a setup I like. And finished the race in the points.”
He was pleased with his pass on Yuki Tsunoda, praising the Japanese’s defence in the final stages of the race:
“It was a good pass. Yuki did a great job to defend and for many laps he kept me behind. Just put his car in all the right spots to destroy my aero in the crucial points. Always getting good exits in the last corner to defend in turn 1. I got him eventually.
“I’m really happy. We made a good step this weekend on the setup. Much better on tyre degradation today than in Bahrain. I’ve got to be really happy with that.”
His adversary for the day, Yuki Tsunoda, wasn’t too pleased on the other hand. Asked about how he felt after the race, he answered:
“Pretty tough, I gave my 100% effort every lap and still couldn’t [get the position] in the end, in the last four laps. So, it was really frustrating for me.”
In the end, the Haas was just to quick for the Japanese driver, who pushed as hard as possible to keep Magnussen behind:
“Yeah, I just lost too much pace in the straight and a couple of corners that required downforce. I just had to push 100% effort in sector one to maximise the pace from our car to make the gap as much as possible, but in the end, he held up well and I lost the position like that.”
