Caldwell: ‘We had nothing to lose’ on path to maiden points haul

12 July 2022

Olli Caldwell says he put everything on the line in his quest to secure his first points in Formula 2 in the demanding Spielberg Feature Race and admitted he had no expectations of where Campos Racing's tyre gamble could take him to.

Starting right at the back of the order due to his best time in Qualifying being deleted for exceeding track limits, he opted to join the half of the field starting the race on slicks despite the rain earlier in the day and a somewhat wet surface around the Red Bull Ring.

However, as a dry line began to form, their risk brought huge rewards. Both he and teammate Roberto Merhi carved their way through past their wet tyre-shod rivals, all the way up to P8 at the chequered flag – and a post-race disqualification for winner Richard Verschoor and a penalty for Jehan Daruvala promoted Caldwell up to P6.

“I’m really happy to be finishing in the points after starting P22,” he remarked. “We went for a gamble starting on the slicks and it definitely paid off. Before the race, I was just hoping to do as many overtakes as possible!

WATCH: HIGHLIGHTS: Tyre gambles bring drama in Spielberg Feature Race

“It was a very 50/50 Decision to go slicks. I think even the whole grid was split 50/50, as Sector 2 was still quite wet. Starting at the back, it was a gamble we had to take as we had nothing to lose.”

One of the biggest obstacles drivers had to overcome at the Austrian circuit was track limits. Having already fallen foul of them in Qualifying, Caldwell says he was determined to avoid a repeat incident during the race and believes that getting in a finding the perfect pattern to approach the 4.318km track was key to staying out of trouble.

“The track isn’t kind to track limits. The way it is laid out and the up and down nature of the circuit makes it easy to go off the circuit. I had a few track limit warnings and after that I found a nice rhythm of maximising the track without going off and still being fast.”

With his first points under his belt, Caldwell is eager to capitalise on this momentum heading into the next round at Le Castellet. In his past two appearances at the French track, he’s finished just off the podium in fourth. His previous form there has got the British driver feeling optimistic about the potential to add more points to his tally, as long as he can address his main weakness so far this season – Qualifying.

“I’m looking forward to going to Paul Ricard. I’ve had some nice success there in the past so would love to go there and get a good result. I’m definitely focusing on fixing my Qualifying. Today showed that I have the pace to drive inside the top 10, just starting there needs to be the focus. Once you start higher up, getting points is much easier. You get ‘pulled’ along by each other with the slipstream.”