P9 Esteban Ocon Chassis 03
Q1: 1:36.936
Q2: 1:36.814
Q3: 1:36.540
Esteban: “I am pretty pleased with the overall result tonight. My Q1 lap was really good and I think we really extracted the best from the car across the session. We missed out on track time in final practice, but it was a great effort by the team to get the car ready for qualifying and make Q3. There will be a threat tomorrow from the cars outside the top ten, starting on better tyres, but hopefully we can make our strategy work starting on the hypersoft. It will be a tricky one but it will be interesting.”
P14 Sergio Perez Chassis 02
Q1: 1:37.255
Q2: 1:37.541
Sergio: “I’m disappointed with our speed today. It’s been a poor weekend in terms of performance and there are still some issues with the car that we haven’t managed to solve. It’s hurting us over a single lap because the car is sliding too much and we’re really losing out. Hopefully it will be a different story tomorrow with a free choice of tyres for the start of the race. I’m targeting points, but it’s not going to be easy starting from P14.”
Otmar Szafnauer, Team Principal and CEO
“We haven’t had a particularly smooth lead up to qualifying and I think that showed in our overall pace this evening. Esteban had power unit and hydraulic issues in final practice, but still managed to qualify in P9 with some tidy laps, which was an excellent effort. Sergio wasn’t happy with the balance and struggled for speed in Q2, which means he will start from P14 with a free choice of tyre. It’s not going to be an easy race tomorrow with all the midfield teams pretty equal in terms of pace, but I think good points are still achievable.”