Fahrerstimmen – Tag 1

Das hat heute unheimlich viel Spaß gemacht und ich habe jede Runde genossen. Der gesamte Anfangssektor mit den schnellen Schikanen und auch der zweite Sektor sind fantastisch. Das Auto fühlte sich auf der Strecke schon gut an. Im ersten Training hatte ich mit relativ viel Untersteuern zu kämpfen, in der zweiten Session war es besser, aber an einigen Stellen noch vorhanden. Ich glaube, dass ich noch mehr Zeit aus dem Auto und mir herausholen kann. Die Strecke gehört definitiv zu den körperlich anstrengendsten. Die Auswirkungen werden wir erst nach einer Renndistanz sehen, aber schon heute konnte ich es spüren und es wird sicher ein harter Sonntag für alle. Die Strecke verzeiht auch nicht viel und es gibt nur wenig Spielraum für Fehler - so sollte es sein.

Diese Strecke ist richtig intensiv, schnell und fordernd. Wirklich ein fantastisches Erlebnis. Ich liebe sie! Hier gibt es keine Zeit zu verschenken und es ist eine der körperlich anspruchsvollsten Strecken, die ich seit einiger Zeit gefahren bin. Ich habe heute versucht, bis ans Limit zu gehen, aber ich glaube, dass es noch ein paar Abschnitte gibt, in denen ich mich steigern kann. Den letzten Sektor habe ich gut im Griff, aber im ersten und zweiten Sektor kann ich auf jeden Fall noch Zeit gutmachen, da Valtteri und Max dort sehr schnell waren. Wir müssen heute Abend noch ein paar Änderungen vornehmen und die Daten genau studieren. Hoffentlich können wir uns morgen dann weiter verbessern. Die Reifen haben sich stark angefühlt und sich gut verhalten, aber es wird schwer, in den schnellen Passagen auf sie Acht zu geben, besonders von Kurve 6 bis 9.

“We can be pretty pleased with how the car is behaving and I think it was a good first day at Mugello. We are not too far off Mercedes which is a good thing and also balance wise, there are always things that can be improved, but overall I was pretty pleased. This is a very cool track to drive in an F1 car with so many fast corners and to be able to take Arrabbiata 1 and 2 flat out easily is quite incredible and really enjoyable to drive. It is pretty physical and I felt alright today but of course 59 laps in a row in the heat is not going to be easy. I like a bit of a challenge and we shouldn’t complain as we train hard to sit in these cars and we should just enjoy it. In terms of tyres, I expected it to be worse so let’s see how they hold up over the rest of the weekend. The track is my type of track - really flowing with no slow corners, so I’m looking forward to doing more laps.”

“It’s been a good day and this track is just so fun to drive. It’s super quick and there’s not much room for error, like we saw with Lando, which adds to the excitement as a driver. It’s a high energy circuit and from Turns 1 to 15, the car is completely different. It’s physical and you do feel it, especially through Turns 8 and 9, it’s just pure neck and it’s good fun. Performance-wise, I think we’re relatively happy, of course there are still some areas to find a bit more balance in the car but coming from Monza where we were struggling, today has been good. The tyres seem to be holding up in the heat and the softs are performing well so it’s looking reasonable out there but I think we’re going to see a few pit stops across the field come Sunday.”

“It’s so good to drive at Mugello. On one lap it’s fun but even on the long runs, which are normally a lot slower, there’s no holding back as it’s all high-speed. Turns 8 and 9 are nearly flat out on high fuel, so it’s quick and keeps you on your toes. I felt we picked it up today quite well. There were a couple of things to improve on in the morning, but we managed that well into the afternoon session. It looks like both cars are in decent shape. The timesheets look okay and, if we put ourselves in that position in qualifying, we’d be very happy.”

“It was a decent day for the team. It’s a new track for everyone, and it’s my first time here as well. It’s a fantastic feeling to drive at Mugello and it didn’t disappoint from expectation! When we walked the track yesterday, I just thought it’s going to be awesome to drive. It’s a great challenge for us drivers, quite physical, and it’s also going to be particularly tough on the tyres. We have plenty of performance to unlock for tomorrow. For me, it’s been probably one of the best Fridays of the year so far.”

“I’ve enjoyed driving around this track: there is no room for mistakes and that’s really fun. The run-off here is very close to the track, so the pressure is on the drivers – and that’s how it should be! The car is feeling good and we focused a bit more on our race pace today. It was a shame to have had the collision with Kimi though. It’s very tough to see another car when you're coming out of the pit lane and the angle to re-join the track is difficult too. I knew he was close, but it's very difficult to judge the distance between cars and I couldn’t avoid him sadly. It just shows that it’s going to be tricky on this narrow circuit this weekend and we know that track position is going to be very important here. We need to aim for a good result in qualifying first of all – to make sure we’re in a position to fight for good points on Sunday.”

“Overall, it was a strong Friday as we finished both sessions in the top 10. It was quite impressive and very enjoyable to drive these F1 cars on such a track with so many high-speed corners, it was very cool! I didn’t feel fully comfortable in the car, so we’ll make some changes for tomorrow to find a bit more performance and get more out of our package.”

“It’s nice to be back driving at Mugello, the track where I made my first laps in an F1 car, 20 years ago. Surely my neck feels a lot better now than it did at the end of my first day of testing! The track has the same feel, it’s not much different with the exception of some kerbs. It’s a difficult circuit, so finding a setup can be challenging, especially being here for the first time and with no data to use as a reference. It’s quite a unique layout in many ways and it needs a different approach, which is why we need to keep working on the setup, both tonight and in FP3. You never run out of things to improve but we looked promising today, so let’s see where we end up tomorrow.”

“Driving an F1 car around this circuit is unbelievable. In all the fast sections it’s pretty impressive. I think it’s going to be quite a tough race, physically, as already in the long run we’ve done in FP2 the neck starts to feel it! The lack of run-off areas will also make it difficult, but I guess this is what we like as well. The first session went well but maybe where we ended up in the second one is a more realistic picture, when we struggled a bit on the hard tyre. We also need to work on the balance, as we are not really there yet. It’s all very close but I think we can make a positive step tomorrow. I am optimistic.”

“It was a positive day out there for us and the car is feeling good, so I'm happy with today's work. Mugello is such an impressive circuit in a Formula 1 car and the speed in some of the high-speed corners is amazing. I can’t wait to tackle the circuit in qualifying on low fuel when we can really push hard. Qualifying is going to be so important here as I think the race will be largely dependent on track position because overtaking will be very difficult. We’ll focus overnight on making sure we come back tomorrow ready to fight for a good starting spot and go from there. The long-run pace is looking positive, so now we need to show our one-lap pace.”

“It was an interesting day. Mugello is a very nice track which is very enjoyable for the driver, even if it is quite brutal on tyres. I’m still not happy with the balance of the car. We are working on it and there’s still plenty to do, but it is Friday, and this is what Fridays are for. I think that there’s the potential to find a better set-up on the car and that we will find some small things. I’m confident we can improve it for qualifying.”

“It’s been a challenging Friday. We haven’t quite managed to get the car in the sweet-spot and we’ve spent the whole day trying things and trying to achieve a better balance. At the moment we’re struggling quite a lot with the changes of direction at the rear and being able to lean on it. “We’re braced for a challenging weekend, but if we manage to achieve a better balance tomorrow morning, our performance can improve considerably. We’re going to work hard tonight and try to get it better.”

“Tricky day. Obviously, I didn’t end it in the best way – over-pushing it a little bit. It’s one of the first proper costly mistakes that I’ve made, almost since I started in F1. It’s a bit frustrating, but at the same time it happens – it happens to everyone. Not ideal but everything until then was going reasonably well. “We made some improvements from FP1 to FP2 but we’ve got a lot of work to do. It’s not been as straightforward as we were hoping for, and we’re struggling a little bit more than we were expecting coming into the weekend. Rough start, but I’m confident we can make up for it tomorrow.”

“It was OK today. We’re at a new circuit and it’s definitely a cool track and it was great fun to drive. We were able to learn a lot and put a good number of laps in, trying to discover what’s best for the car here, as you need a good car balance in order to have confidence. I think we have some room for improvement for tomorrow and we’ll do our best to achieve it.”

It was awesome out there today. It is always fun to come to a proper great circuit with lots of character, it’s undulating and punishes you if you make a mistake. The speeds are very high, so it was good fun out there. The tyres are taking a pounding, so we have a bit of work to do to get on top of that. The race is going to be difficult yet exciting, as nobody knows how it will pan out. We have a good idea of how we need to get the car set up, so we shall see.

“It’s nice to be on track in Italy again, and seeing some fans in the stands. We missed having spectators and hopefully they’ll watch a nice race on Sunday. The track here in Mugello is amazing, especially with modern Formula One cars: it’s just so fast, with many high-speed corners that really feel great in an F1 car – even if the neck will really feel it on Sunday! The car felt really good from the start today, on both qualifying and race trim, so we can be happy about our first day. Unfortunately, I did a small mistake during my fast lap in FP2 so the times don’t reflect how we really did, but tomorrow is when we really need to put together a good lap. I think we can do a good job; getting to Q2 is the target, then we can assess our chances. We saw already that following cars will be quite difficult, so it will be important to qualify as far high as we can, get a good start and build our race from there.”

It was a pretty fun day. It is a very intense track with high speeds, which is what we expected. FP1 was tricky, the tyres were not working as expected and the car was sliding a lot. We managed to improve this for FP2, and the performance runs were not so bad. It will be hot over the weekend, and it is a very rough track with a lot of corners so I think tyre management will be key. It will be about weighing up how much you want to set the car up to preserve the tyres for all the high speed corners, but at the same time still have a car that you can race with if you have the opportunity to pass, which we know will be difficult at this track.

“This is a really cool track. It’s extremely fast with lots of high-speed corners - it’s really a pleasure to drive this track. Obviously, looking at the lap times, it could have been a better day, but at least I enjoyed driving the track. We just didn’t seem to have great pace today. It’s pretty physical here, pretty tough on the neck with all the high-speed corners. They’re not totally straightforward so you can’t just rest your head on the side like a lot of other fast corners at other tracks. It’s going to be tough, but I’ll manage. It’s an old school track and that’s a positive. There’s no tarmac run-off anywhere, there are big consequences if you make a mistake. I think that adds to why this track is cool.”

“I actually think we’re in a decent place, there’s potential in the car. We just need to work on three corners – turns one, 12 and 15, that’s where we weren’t so happy, but the rest of the lap was pretty good. It was the same with the only lap I did in the afternoon, it was fast. It’s obviously not ideal at a new circuit not to be able to do a long run or a quali sim though. I don’t have much information for tomorrow. The circuit is good, really good in fact. It’s very fast, flowing and for us as drivers, it’s a pure pleasure. From a racing aspect, it could be trickier, but for now we don’t care – we’re just going out there driving fast. I think we’re something like five seconds faster than the last time I drove here. Every kind of corner you’d like to have on a circuit – you have them here at Mugello.”