21/09/2024
NEWS STORY
Yuki Tsunoda: "It's been a while since we were in Q3, and today finally we made it!
"We were waiting for this moment, so well done and thanks to the Team. Obviously, as a driver, you're always aiming for a perfect qualifying, and unfortunately, the last run was a bit messy. We were tight on time during the warm-up lap, so we had to rush, which compromised our last push lap a bit. Initially, I was a bit frustrated when I crossed the finish line, but considering our performance in the last few races, this is a big achievement for us. It won't be easy tomorrow, we'll try to catch the Haas in front of us but at the same time, we'll have to look at some fast cars behind us. We'll do as much as we can to try and score points."
Daniel Ricciardo: "Today wasn't good. We really struggled on the softs, every set we used today, we weren't competitive. Our pace was good yesterday, which is why we didn't change much on the car overnight. In FP3, we performed well on the medium. However, it was a lot harder for us to get the most out of the soft tyre, and we didn't find a solution in qualifying. There was only a tenth between us and Q2, but we expected more based on yesterday's practice."
Guillaume Dezoteux (Head of Vehicle Performance): "Back to Q3! After a solid Friday, the engineering group was focused on making small changes to optimize the car balance and extract the best out of the Soft tyres. The overall performance of the team in qualifying session has been strong confirming the competitiveness of our car in this kind of track. Yuki progressed to Q2 and then Q3 by putting solid lap times together and he qualified P8, which is a good starting position for tomorrow's race. For Daniel, the pace was very similar but finding the limit on braking in a couple of places has been more difficult and cost him Q2 by one tenth. We need to understand better this limitation as every detail counts in this tight field. Tonight, we will review the various options for the race strategy and the tyre usage tomorrow, hoping for points to defend our position in the Constructors' championship."
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