Schumacher left to reflect on points that got away after his costly mistake

The race at the Valencia Street Circuit set a record for number of finishers with 24 as there was not a single retirement for only the third time in Formula 1 history.

Such was the strange nature of what was a rare tedious race, in contrast to the chaos that took place in Canada two weeks ago, there were also no penalties and no spins.

The only incident out of the ordinary saw Renault’s Vitaly Petrov run over the front wing of Schumacher’s Mercedes as he emerged on track following his first pit stop.

After drawing praise for his performance in Montreal when he came home fourth, on this occasion it was a case of down to earth with a bump for the seven-times champion, who trailed home 17th.

“Not a very satisfying race for me,” said Schumacher.

“The outcome was decided after lap 15 when I slid into Petrov and lost the points I could perhaps have achieved.

“Our race pace should have allowed me to finish more or less where I started, but that is really only speculation after the incident.

“I saw Petrov quite late, even though I was aware he was coming, and tried to brake as late as possible and go round the corner with him.

“But when I wanted to draw back, I locked the front wheel and slipped into him, which was clearly my mistake.

“From then onwards the race was done and I just had to drive the car over the finish line.

“We will now look ahead to Silverstone which is one of our home races.”

Team principal Ross Brawn also felt a points finish was on the cards as he said: “His collision was frustrating.

“He was running at a very similar level to Nico (Rosberg) in the early stages and could also have finished close to him, in the points.”