Paul Di Resta celebrates 'best race' of 2011 in Singapore Grand Prix

The Force India driver secured his best result in Formula 1 at the Marina Bay circuit after a strong drive to sixth position in the Force India.

It was the Scot's fifth points finish of 2011.

"My first Singapore Grand Prix was a lot of fun and I'm very happy with the outcome," said di Resta, who has managed 20 points so far in his rookie season.

"I don't think the safety car really helped us because I still had a lot of life left in the supersoft tyres in the middle of the race, but it didn't really hurt us either.

"After that it was a case of managing my pace to Rosberg, looking after the tyres and bringing the car home. I was in free air for the final part of the race, which helped, and the pace was strong.

"It's probably my best race of the season, but it's the result of all the hard work behind the scenes. We came here with an upgrade package that has allowed us to gain performance in the race, gain tyre life, and we saw the benefits of that today."

Team-mate Adrian Sutil also finished in the points - in eighth position - to help Force India consolidate its sixth place in the standings.

With five races to go, the team is 12 points ahead of Sauber.

"We have been aiming to get both cars in the points for a while now, so we can be very happy with where we finished," Sutil said. "The points we scored give us some breathing space over Sauber in the championship.

"It was quite a normal race for me, although I lost some track position under the safety car as Rosberg got ahead of me and stayed there until the end of the race.

"The final stint was quite difficult because I had to do about 30 laps on the soft tyres. I had Perez close behind me and then Massa was closing in fast on the final lap. Fortunately I had enough to hold on to eighth."