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Di Resta happy to talk up victory chances

Paul di Resta: "If you can get that car in the operating window, the car is probably where Williams was at one point last year" © Sutton Images

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Paul di Resta says it isn't unreasonable to think Force India could secure a surprise victory at some point this season.

Having run in the top three for much of the Bahrain Grand Prix, di Resta ultimately finished fourth after being passed by Romain Grosjean late on. Adrian Sutil also led a portion of the race in Melbourne, highlighting the performance potential in the Force India, and di Resta said if the circumstances were right the team has a car capable of springing a surprise.

Asked if it was ridiculous to be talking about winning a race this year, di Resta replied: "Not really, I'm never going to talk down a win!

"I never am as a racing driver, that would be silly if I did. If you look at where we've been in grands prix and you look at, for instance, some grands prix that we've been very strong at last year I believe at those grands prix we would be a step forward from where we were and that's probably the difference.

"If you can get that car in the operating window, the car is probably where Williams was at one point last year and they obviously got right in that window last year and won the race - but I believe that was probably down to other people not maximising what they had."

Di Resta said such hopes of pulling off a shock result would depend on Force India staying ahead of the likes of McLaren and Sauber.

"There will definitely be grands prix where we're stronger than at others. It's definitely shown that the heat is helping us. Here and Monaco you need a lot of downforce to get the lap time out of it; we're still not optimal in our downforce sectors, we seem to be a bit better in the drag sectors. So we know we've got a bit of a challenge here, however it's high tyre wear and our car seems to be on the better side of tyre wear and stuff.

"But it really depends how much McLaren has moved on as well, and the likes of Sauber. There's been a lot of talk in the media that they're bringing some big updates, but we've heard people say that before and they've not worked. The conservative approach that we generally have as a team throughout the year generally seems to work for us."

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