The Midfield
Force India had a solid but ultimately fruitless outing as Paul di Resta finished P11 and Sutil P13. Di Resta had an awful start that saw him drop six places but after that he had consistent pace in the tricky conditions and put together a two-stop race that saw some good racing. He struggled with the hard tyres at the end and couldn't challenge Ricciardo for the final point of the season but was generally satisfied. Sutil was disappointed not to challenge for the points but found the conditions alright, however he couldn't make a two-stop strategy work with tyre wear issues and had to pit late in the race. A final charge saw him bearing down on Gutierrez and teammate Di Resta but he ran out of laps to overtake. Overall however both drivers were satisfied to help the team secure sixth in the constructors' championship, only beaten by the bigger teams. Gutierrez was unable to break through from the back after a poor qualifying and finished P12. He enjoyed a good start but struggled with the first stint on hard tyres as the only other driver besides Button to choose them, but performed better on the medium tyres for the rest of the race. He suffered front graining but enjoyed himself in Brazil with a positive end to the season as he finished the year as the highest scoring rookie with six points. Whether it will be enough to save his seat will remain to be seen. Lotus had a terrible final weekend that saw their hopes of even mathematically challenging Mercedes or Ferrari in the constructors' go up in smoke, quite literally when Grosjean's Renault engine let go in a huge cloud of it onto the pit straight on lap four. He was understandably disappointed to retire but pleased with his season. Kovalainen had another poor start and dropped backwards, leaving him work to do in a car he wasn't entirely comfortable with on his way to a P14 finish. He was disappointed not to challenge for points and do better, but happy for the opportunity. Jean-Eric Vergne had a poor start and like his teammate struggled with his car, having problems with balance and simply not having enough confidence to push in the deceptively damp weather conditions. Things improved as the race went on but not by much, and then he was involved in an altercation with Maldonado on lap 65 that spun the Williams around at turn one. No action was taken though and Vergne eventually made it home P15 to finish a year mixed with disappointment and bad luck, along with some moments of genuine pace. Maldonado finished P16 to wrap up his Williams career, battling with those around him but unable to get anywhere near the points as he struggled for pace. He was also spun late in the race in his incident with Vergne, and it closed out the difficult relationship between him and the team fittingly. Bottas had been running better after a better grid position and buoyed confidence from the USA, running well on the option tyres and battling for points with a chance of grabbing some until Hamilton pulled over on him as he overtook on lap 46, connecting with his rear left wheel and shattering it, taking the Williams straight off and into retirement for the winter. It was a disappointing end for the Williams-Renault package ahead of their switch to Mercedes engines for 2014.