Jolyon Palmer picked up a creditable 13th place finish at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, extracting maximum performance from his Renault R.S.16 throughout the Spanish Grand Prix, and getting the better of team-mate Kevin Magnussen.

Jolyon made a solid getaway from 17^th on the grid, battling hard as the pack weaved its way through the opening turns. Drama ensued up ahead as the Mercedes duo of Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton came together in spectacular fashion on the entry of turn four, sending both cars spinning off into the gravel and out of the race. A brief safety car period followed and by its end, Jolyon had moved into 15^th with the loss of the Silver Arrows from proceedings.

Palmer’s opening ten laps were strong, which left him breathing down the neck of Haas’ Esteban Gutierrez at the final chicane. The 25-year-old made his move on the way into the right-left but the Mexican was able to hold off the Renault's charge before the first round of pit-stops. This left Jolyon within touching distance of team-mate Magnussen, just two seconds up the road, at the head of a train of cars in close company scrapping for 12^th position.

The Briton was forced into running a longer second stint before pitting for a set of hard-compound Pirelli tyres, aiming to go to the end of the Grand Prix. After his second pit-stop, yielding 14^th position, he was able to keep then race leader Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo honest with a string of strong laps before and after yielding for waved blue flags.

Jolyon carried this pace through his final stint on hard rubber, making his way up to 13^th, right with stablemate Magnussen with fifteen laps to go. After reeling the sister Renault in at a rate of knots, Jolyon made his move with short shrift for P12 before setting off on the chase for Toro Rosso’s Dani Kvyat ahead.

That move on his team-mate would be his last of the race but another strong, mature performance over the race distance saw him notch an eventual 13^th placed finish – getting the very best out of the car beneath him over the 66 laps.

"I think that was probably the best race I’ve done in terms of pace and performance," said Jolyon. "The car was feeling okay, we were battling tyre degradation a bit but it was manageable. It’s a bit disappointing not to finish in the points but for myself, I’m happy. More performance should be coming from the upgrades we have in store so I’m looking forward to Monaco."

Fred Vasseur, Racing Director, said: "That was a tough race for us but both our drivers pushed hard, right until the chequered flag. Kevin struggled on the hard tyre so we switched strategy for him whereas Jolyon was able to make the most of a two-stop strategy and gave us his best performance to date."