Nico Rosberg described his maiden F1 win in the Chinese Grand Prix as an “unbelievable feeling”.
Speaking after scoring his first win in his 111th start he said: “It’s very, very cool. I’m very happy and very excited
“It’s been a long time coming for me and for the team also for the past two years and a bit.”
He added: “It’s really nice to see also how quickly we are progressing.
“I didn’t expect to be that fast today. I expected that we had a good chance to be in front but I’m very happy with the pace we had in the race.”
Mercedes had poor race pace in the first two Grands Prix of 2012 but Rosberg was able to win despite making one fewer pit stop than those closest to him.
He paid tribute to the work the team had done since the last race: “Big thanks to the whole team because all the engineers especially in the last weeks have been working very hard – as has everybody else – Just improving the set-up because we really struggled in the first two races with the race pace.
“And today it all came good and it’s great to see how quickly we’ve been able to progress which is fantastic.”
2012 Chinese Grand Prix
- F1 fans’ videos from the Chinese and Bahrain races
- First win makes Rosberg the Chinese GP Driver of the Weekend
- Rosberg’s China win rated fifth-best race of last five years
- Rosberg becomes F1’s third second-generation race winner
- Vote for your Chinese Grand Prix driver of the weekend
Image © Daimler/Hoch Zwei
Maksutov (@maksutov)
15th April 2012, 10:18
It’s very, very cool.
Skett (@skett)
15th April 2012, 10:21
haha +1
rpiian (@rpiian)
15th April 2012, 11:05
Bah I missed it!!!
Scottie (@scottie)
15th April 2012, 10:20
great way to win your first GP! WD Nico! WD Mercedes for finding the right direction for the car!
Alfisti37 (@alfisti37)
15th April 2012, 10:21
Who’s the next one to challenge Rosberg’s record of most points without a win?
AndrewT (@andrewt)
15th April 2012, 10:23
That would be Nick Heidfeld with 259
Alfisti37 (@alfisti37)
15th April 2012, 10:29
@andrewt I mean, I’m guessing who will break Rosberg’s record :)
Damon (@damon)
15th April 2012, 11:17
Rosberg does not hold the record of most points without a win. He might hold the record of most points prior to the first win. That’s a big difference.
But as shown in other comments, he’s not even holding that one.
AndrewT (@andrewt)
15th April 2012, 10:21
“Been a long time coming”, but not the longest, on the current grid Button scored his first win on his 114th (2006 Hungarian Grand Prix), and Webber on his 132th (2009 German Grand Prix).
leadfoot (@leadfoot)
16th April 2012, 13:04
Button was surprising given the fanfare when he came into the sport. If Alonso’s wheel didn’t fall off he wouldn’t have won that race either. A bit of a late bloomer that one.
Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
15th April 2012, 10:22
Well done to him. It was a long wait but hopefully this will open it up for him, like it happened to Button and to some extent to Webber too.
Honestly, I think none of us saw that one coming, even after starting from pole. I wondered in the middle of the race what were they doing, because they were losing a lot of time to Button, but it turned out to be the best strategy. Congrats to them and the team! Deserved!
matt90 (@matt90)
15th April 2012, 10:57
Doubt he’ll want it quite like Button- otherwise he faces 2 awful season!
Victor. (@victor)
15th April 2012, 11:29
Winning 5 races (I think) is awful?
czhihong (@czhihong)
15th April 2012, 11:38
He meant after Button first won in Hungary 2006.
Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
15th April 2012, 12:15
@matt90 I mean, I hope he gets his second quickly enough and he can go on and win more too. Obviously, a good car needs to be with him, otherwise it’s difficult…
BasCB (@bascb)
15th April 2012, 16:23
I bet he would love to emanate his father, winning the Championship in the year of his first win @fer-no65
TimG (@timg)
15th April 2012, 20:06
Nico’s already won as many races, now all he needs is for a couple of the other title contenders to have serious accidents or serial unreliability and he’s as good as champion. If we can add in rules controversy or two, a civil war between the FIA and FOTA, and get Argentina to invade the Falklands then the scene is set for the perfect re-enactment of 1982.
cjpdk (@cjpdk)
16th April 2012, 21:20
Argentina’s invasion of the Falkland Islands cancelled the Argentinian Grand Prix
Violence in Bahrain could result in the cancellation of the Bahrain Grand Prix
Just saying…
Eggry (@eggry)
15th April 2012, 10:37
It’s good to see Nico won but it would be another 2009? I hope not.
OOliver
15th April 2012, 10:56
Congratulations to Rosberg ad Mercedes. This win was long overdue and it was almost becoming embarassing for Mercedes. They may yet go on to achieve greater feats.
AndrewTanner (@andrewtanner)
15th April 2012, 14:49
I’m sure they will. A company and race team of that talent will win a championship one day.
bearforce1 (@bearforce1)
15th April 2012, 11:06
So so please for Nico.
I have a question how did Mercedes turn the car around form a tyre eating quali pace only car to fast race pace best on tyres winner? What happened?
Palle (@palle)
15th April 2012, 14:34
yes, that is probably the most impressive about it. I knew Nico could do it if he got the chance with a car which is competitive all race.
But I think he was very lucky that Button had problems during a pitstop – without that I think Button would have had him. And Kimi helped a lot also in keeping the pack behind for a long time. Sorry for him that the strategy turned out so bad. And I think Vettel did very good damage limitation.
And fantastic footage of the frustrated Merc Mechanic at Schuey’s pitstop: You could almost hear him yelling: “I didn’t signal – I wasn’t ready!”
Robbie (@robbie)
16th April 2012, 12:55
I think it is as Brawn said before this race…the first two races offered variable ambient and track temps that caught them out in terms of getting the right setup to get the tires into the right operating window on Sunday. He said that given a stable temp weekend they would stand a much better chance of getting their cars into that proper operating window. Looks like they nailed it this weekend. Especially for NR, as MS was loosing ground to him while he was still in the race.
So it will be interesting to see if Merc now has a good handle on this tire performance window issue, or will another unstable weekend temp-wise catch them out again. ie. how fine a line is it for them and other teams to hit the tire performance mark, or miss it?
Meanwhile, I think this will be a huge boost for NR who was already handling things at Merc beautifully over the past 2 seasons. Onward and upward for NR.
alexf1man (@alexf1man)
15th April 2012, 11:13
This time, I have 4 correct in top 5, with 2 in correct positions!
My prediction was:
Pole Time – 01:34.683
Pole – Jenson Button (Rosberg)
Position 1 – Jenson Button (P2)
Position 2 – Sebastian Vettel (P5)
Position 3 – Lewis Hamilton (CORRECT!)
Position 4 – Mark Webber (CORRECT!)
Position 5 – Fernando Alonso (Rosberg, P1)
Mustalainen (@mustalainen)
15th April 2012, 12:12
That’s a pretty okay prediction you have there! Mine was the following:
Pole – Button
1 – Button
2 – Hamilton
3 – Webber
4 – Vettel
5 – Räikkönen
Remove Rosberg from the race result and I’d have had the top 4 right. Nevertheless great result from Rosberg this weekend, straight from qualifying to the end of the race. What an effort! Continuing at this pace in Bahrain, it could be a season to remember for him and Mercedes!
Steph (@)
15th April 2012, 11:27
No kidding.
In all seriousness though, congrats to him and Mercedes.
sato113 (@sato113)
15th April 2012, 11:54
the last time we had a first-time winner was webber in 2009!
AndrewTanner (@andrewtanner)
15th April 2012, 14:53
@sato113 I was thinking the same to myself when I was tidying my kitchen a couple of hours ago :D
verstappen (@verstappen)
15th April 2012, 12:26
Now let’s hope they also know and understand enough about the set up in warmer conditions. And that they share this data with the other side of the garage…
AndrewTanner (@andrewtanner)
15th April 2012, 14:53
I would have been happy with either Mercedes bagging a victory today, for separate reasons you can probably work out. However, I do prefer Rosberg getting it, simply because it is so overdue for him. I know Schumacher won’t begrudge him it either.
Robbie (@robbie)
16th April 2012, 13:05
As much as I am no MS fan as some around here would have noticed by now, I found him to appear very calm and level headed and diplomatic on Sunday. His in-race interview after he went out had him saying of his tire nut issue…’that’s part of the game’…any time they showed him on camera in the pits while NR was out there doing his thing had him appear to be right in there with the team hoping for the best for NR. Ultimately I think MS will only take heart from this that they can now say they have a proven race-winner of a car, so I’m sure MS is thinking his day will come too, and he’s just thankful that they aren’t still in a distant 4th place car.
sebsronnie (@sebsronnie)
15th April 2012, 16:21
Well done Nico! But please don’t get too excited during the celebrations – we all remember what happened the last time a young German driver got excited in a Chinese night club (last year) :-)
DaveW (@dmw)
15th April 2012, 18:23
I hope it stops a trend of factory teams quitting or avoiding f1. Need bmw and VAG back in. Maybe a US brand too.
David-A (@david-a)
15th April 2012, 19:48
Very well done to Nico getting a win after 5 seasons! Four more needed to equal his father :P