Sutil vindicates Mallya's faith

According to the Indian billionaire, Sutil has earned his place in Formula One after nearly scoring the team's first points with an extraordinary run to fourth place in the rain-affected Monte Carlo race, before he was hit by Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari.

"Adrian Sutil has a lot of ability and talent, and we're glad and proud to have him in our team," said Mallya.

"Some people started questioning my decision to keep him when he didn't finish a few races at the start of the season, but I think he has more than redeemed himself."

Mallya also paid tribute to his team and cited their one-stop strategy as a key contributing factor to what was, by far, Force India's most competitive performance to date.

"The race strategy was right, the set-up was right, and to see a Force India car running fourth in Monaco was a great pleasure while it lasted," he said. "We were seven minutes from home. It was unfortunate, but I guess that's what racing is all about.

"I can't say that I'm not feeling sad, because I am, but we'll get over it and we'll take away a lot of positives."

"Our strategy was one stop, we filled ourselves up with fuel," he added. "I told both drivers to stay out of trouble on lap one. We have normally started very well and had incidents on the first lap, so I said stay right out of trouble, take your time, you're going to go for a one-stop strategy, bring both cars home.

"We knew that we were good in the wet, Adrian has demonstrated that before as well, and everything worked to perfection until that fateful moment."

Mallya admitted that the sight of Sutil trailing back to the pits with a broken rear suspension brought tear to his eyes.

"I was [nearly crying], and so were many of us actually." he said. "I've had quite a lot of SMS messages and phone calls from supporters in India, all of whom are I think highly emotional. But such things happen in racing, that's what I've been telling everyone. F1 wouldn't be F1 if it wasn't as unpredictable as it is."