Lewis Hamilton managed to convert ninth on the grid to second at the flag in Austria, but despite the successful damage limitation the Mercedes driver was clearly frustrated to lose out to teammate Nico Rosberg once again.
Hamilton had a superb first lap and was in fourth place â behind Rosberg â by the end of it.
"We've been working very hard on our starts throughout the year," said Hamilton. "And the team have done a great job to help out with that, and so I got one of the best starts I've ever had really and positioned the car in the correct places.
"It would have been great if I'd started where perhaps I should have started this weekend â but damage limitation. To get from ninth to second and be pressuring Nico at the end of the race really shows the pace that I had this weekend."
Hamilton admitted that concerns over brake temperatures had been a handicap during the race, and made it impossible for him to attack Rosberg at the end.
"I need to check later but it was constantly an issue during the race. Obviously I was following people all the time so that's not always the best but I was being told to back off quite a lot, unfortunately. The last couple of laps I tried to eke it up a little bit more, but still I had to be cautious, but I'm just grateful I finished. I didn't finish the last race, that's really got to be goal for the next few races, trying to actually finish."
He also lost critical time in the pit stops, with a deficit of around 1.9s to his teammate: "I didn't even know I lost that much time, they didn't feel that fast. Could be my positioning. I don't know. Obviously it is frustrating when you lose time because you're constantly doing everything you can to gain a tenth here, a tenth there, so when you lose quite a chunk â two seconds over two pit stops â it's tough. At least we haven't really made any mistakes. If we step back a little bit and look, we've had so many 1-2 [finishes] this is just incredible this year, so I'm hoping in the future we won't have those problems."
