Romain Grosjean celebrated his birthday by finishing seventh in Sunday’s Bahrain Grand Prix.

It saw the Enstone-based Lotus driver, who was 29 on Friday, end in the points for the second race running, following his seventh place in Shanghai.

It proved an eventful race for teammate Pastor Maldonado, who finished 15th after being involved in a collision with Williams driver Felipe Massa on the first lap.

The race was won by reigning world champion Lewis Hamilton in his Mercedes.

“It had been a tough weekend until now for me, so it was really great to get another strong seventh position,”

said Grosjean.

“The race was great, especially as there was lots of overtaking. I was really hoping to catch Daniel Ricciardo (in sixth), but he was too quick for us.

“It was quite difficult to manage tyres, especially with the rears, so I think we did a good job to make the two-stop strategy work.

“We only had new medium compound tyres for the race, the rest were scrubbed, so it really was a great job by the team.

“It was a good recovery from Friday and Saturday’s session.

“I’ll happily take seventh place as my birthday gift for myself and the team.”

Maldonado added: “That was a frustrating race for me.

“I pushed as hard as possible at the start on the medium tyres whilst everyone around me was on the grippier soft compound rubber.

“Once I moved to the soft tyres I was able to set the race’s then fastest lap so things looked good with our strategy.

“Unfortunately the engine antikill triggered when I came in to make my final pit stop, which cost me a lot of time.

“It’s frustrating as we should have finished strongly.

“My focus is now Barcelona (on May 8-10) where I’ve delivered very strongly in the past.”