09/06/2024
NEWS STORY
Max Verstappen: "It was a really rewarding victory today, these kind of races are a lot of fun as you don't know what is going to be thrown at you and I enjoyed racing today.
"With the weather so bad it was so easy to make a mistake; we had to be really focused as one tiny move off the racing line could result in us going off the track into the wall. The Team made all the right calls at the right time and remained really calm. If you look at the last few weekends that we have had in these conditions, we have typically always done well, so that gave me a lot of confidence going into today. We also got quite lucky with the safety car, sometimes it can work for you and sometimes against you but that is racing! Once we were on the slick tyres at the end, the car had pretty decent pace and we managed to keep it going until the end. It was a tough weekend but I am really proud to bring home my 60th win."
Sergio Perez: "I have lost a lot of momentum recently and I will be working hard in the next couple of weeks to get back to form. I picked up some damage to my front wing on the first lap when Gasly and I touched, which compromised my first stint and lost us some momentum. There was only one dry line for most of the race and it was so difficult to pass at times. Later the dry line started to open up and as it did my inters were a little bit too used, then when I went onto the new inter and changed front wing I had good pace but it was still tricky to get by. The incident was on me, I touched the wet part into turn six and I couldn't stop the car, I couldn't touch the brakes. It has been a very tough couple of weekends, we will regroup, keep our heads down and learn from the weekend. We identified a couple of issues after qualifying and they meant we would have qualified a lot higher. Hopefully we can be back to our form in Spain and get back to the level we were at earlier in the season. I am confident in that, there are good tracks coming for us."
Christian Horner: "In a race like today with those variable conditions, so many things can go wrong but we made the right calls at the right times. McLaren were fast on the inters at the beginning of the race, but getting the crossover onto the slick tyre was really crucial, and once we gave away track position, we had some heat in the tyres and could really push. Max was incredible today. In those conditions you're driving with your senses, but everything must work in unison and the Team lifted itself to the adverse conditions and delivered in every area. There are so many things you can get wrong on a day like today, but happily we got them right. It was however a horrible weekend for Checo, but thankfully Ferrari didn't score with either of their cars and we were able to mitigate the damage. We'll assess the car once we get back to Europe and Checo will put this weekend behind him. We know that he's incredibly resilient and will dust himself off and come back fighting in Barcelona."