Fahrerstimmen – Tag 2

Es war schwierig, das Auto für die trockenen Bedingungen hier abzustimmen, weil die beiden Trainings gestern verregnet waren. Aber als wir heute einige Runs mit viel Benzin sowie ein paar Qualifying-Runs üben konnten, bekam ich ein gutes Gefühl. Ich bekam meine Runden hin und war bereits auf einer weiteren guten Runde, als Dani abflog. Das Team teilte mir mit, dass er okay war - das hörten wir alle gerne. Ich bin zuversichtlich für morgen. Vielen Dank an das Team für dieses Auto. Es scheint, als ob wir hier stärker als in Singapur sind.

Das Auto fühlt sich an diesem Wochenende relativ perfekt an. Meine Ingenieure haben fantastisch gearbeitet und mir hat das Duell gegen Nico Spaß gemacht. Er hat eine großartige Leistung gezeigt und es war sehr spannend heute. Auf dieser Strecke kämpft man ständig, um sich zu verbessern. Meine letzte Runde begann sehr gut und ich lag in Kurve sieben vorne, aber dann kam die rote Flagge und damit war es vorbei. Es war ein heftiger Crash, aber zum Glück ist Daniil nichts passiert. Morgen wird es hart. Es hängt von den Bedingungen ab. Der Start wird entscheidend, da man hier nicht nah hinterherfahren kann. Dadurch ist es schwierig, zu überholen. Aber ich werde mein Bestes geben.

I’m really happy to be third again in Suzuka. It has been a good day. We made some changes after FP3 and those changes were exactly what we needed, so as a team we have really performed well. I feel comfortable with the car and around here that is very important. I enjoyed the session a lot. We have limited data on tyre wear due to the conditions yesterday, but starting third we need to target the podium tomorrow.

It was a tricky session for myself. I didn’t really get going at the beginning, I couldn’t feel the car so I struggled a bit to find the right balance. On my second run on the medium tyres in Q3, there was a big improvement as compared to the lap I had done in Q2, as if the car had “become alive”. In the end we can be reasonably happy, I had a decent lap and I was a lot happier than previously; having scored a lap time which is competitive. Third place on the grid would have been the maximum today, but I missed this by one position. Mercedes are back to their usual level of competitiveness, as we have seen – unfortunately – all year. They will be the ones to beat tomorrow, but for sure we will try everything we can, even if we may expect stronger competition from Red Bull Racing and Williams.

It was a good qualifying where we managed to save a set of tyres for tomorrow. The car was competitive even if I didn’t get to show its full pace due to the red flag in Q3. After such a big accident it’s good to see Daniil jump out of the car. We have a long race tomorrow which we are looking forward to and I believe we can deliver a strong performance.

The result of this qualifying is a bit disappointing, as we had a good speed all the way through and the behavior of the car was pretty good. The first two qualifying laps went well, bu my first run in Q3 was average, my tires did not have the right grip. It’s a bit disappointing not having been able to run my second lap: I’m sure we could have improved, but the red flag stopped the session. For the race tomorrow it’s a bit unknown, because nobody had the time to run in dry conditions and do long runs, but I think we should be fine. Hopefully we have done all things correctly so that we can gain some positions. It’s going to be a long race, starting behind other cars, but we’ll try to make a good start and then go from there.

Firstly, the most important thing is that Dany is okay. I haven’t seen a replay; I only saw the car when I passed it but the team was on the radio to let me know he was fine. As for today’s session, in general it went reasonably well. I don’t think seventh shows how happy I was with the car, because I thought we were on for a top five, but we’re still in a good place for tomorrow. We’re also in a good place for tyre wear, so we’ll see what happens. Strategy is open for the race, it’s possible to do one stop but two stops will probably be the trend.

I didn’t expect to go into Q3, we thought we were half a second off so this was a great job from everyone! I had a really good lap for Q3. I didn’t get to do my second run, but the main thing is that Daniil is okay and out of the car. For the race, we’ll certainly aim to keep the starting position and score some points.

Starting from ninth place is not too bad all things considered and we can race well from there. It’s a shame I couldn’t complete my lap in Q3, but the main thing is that Daniil [Kvyat] is okay. Perhaps if I had the opportunity to set a time I could have been ahead of Romain [Grosjean], but hopefully I can get ahead of him at the start tomorrow because I think Lotus will be our main competition. It’s going to be a tough race because there are some quick cars ahead of us, but you never know what can happen here and we still need to see what happens with the weather. Tyre management is always important in this race and with the wet Friday there are still some question marks.

It's disappointing to be out in Q2, it was definitely a day to get into the top ten easily. Unfortunately, during my second Q2 run, we picked-up some vibrations on the front tyres, which meant that I couldn't improve my time and missed out in getting into Q3. It's been difficult to adapt to this track in the dry. I had just 20 laps to learn the circuit and today it's all been a build-up until Q2, when I finally felt totally comfortable and knew exactly what lines to take. I was ready to get into Q3 and it was a big shame not to make it in the end. I was starting to have great fun! For tomorrow our objective is to finish in the points again. I have a set of new Option tyres available, so that should help a bit, and I also have a good car so I'm convinced we can have a great race.

I was hoping to get into Q3 and although things were quite close, we didn’t make it. We were still working on getting the best out of the medium compound tyres from this morning and we improved a little bit this afternoon, but not enough. Hopefully the strategy, combined with saving new tyres for tomorrow, should work and we can recover a few places in the race.

“That was probably the best lap of my career around Suzuka. I could have fitted 100 more sets of tyres to the car, and I probably still wouldn’t have bettered that Q2 lap-time. “It’s frustrating to end up 14th, but that’s the situation at the moment. And it’s not as though anyone in the team is relaxing. No, we’re pushing hard, but there are no magic solutions. “Tomorrow’s race will be tough – there are faster cars behind, such as Max’s [Verstappen], but we’ll do our best to try to get some points. “For all the fans who are supporting us, it would be nice to get both cars to the chequered flag tomorrow.”

Of course it’s disappointing to miss out on Q3 by such a small margin, but I can't complain too much about our performance today. I think my qualifying lap was pretty good and I felt I was pushing the car to its limit: unfortunately that wasn't enough, but I know it was our best effort. It's difficult to know what we can expect in tomorrow's race: the midfield battle is very tight and everyone around me will make it really hard for me to get back into the points. I had hoped to qualify a bit higher to offset my penalty, especially as this is not the easiest place to overtake. It will be interesting to see how the lack of running from yesterday will affect others: we managed to do a good job with our set-up this morning, but there are plenty of unknowns about the long run pace.

“The Q1 yellow flag in the middle sector meant I had to lift. Without that, I probably would have got through to Q2. However, I wasn’t told in which engine mode to put the car. Every time before we start a timed lap, we’re instructed over the radio to adopt a particular setting, but I didn’t get told, and I went to the wrong setting. “The car didn’t feel too bad to drive – but we needed to get everything out of it today, and we didn’t. You can’t make a single mistake here – even going half-a-turn out on the front wing makes a big difference. “The race will be tough for everyone tomorrow. But as usual we’ll try our best.”

Das war ein enttäuschendes Qualifying. Aufgrund eines Fahrfehlers bei meinem ersten Versuch hatte ich einen Nachteil für den zweiten. Ich bin mit dem Hinterreifen von der Streckenbegrenzung abgekommen und habe dadurch eingangs Kurve 13 die Kontrolle über mein Auto verloren. Für meinen zweiten Versuch hatte ich daher keine Referenz. Ich war dann auf einer guten Runde und hätte es ohne die gelben Flaggen im zweiten Sektor womöglich in Q2 geschafft. Es ist schade, da sicher mehr möglich gewesen wäre. Morgen müssen wir alles geben.

Das war Pech heute. Denn Q2 wäre aus meiner Sicht durchaus möglich gewesen. Ich war gerade auf meiner besten Runde, als ich die gelben Flaggen sah. Im Rennen müssen wir jede sich bietende Chance wahrnehmen, auch wenn das Überholen auf dieser Strecke schwierig ist.

Certainly not the best of days! I had a sudden loss of power, all the electricity shut-down in the hairpin and from there on I couldn't do anything. It's very frustrating, because the car was going very well, but in the end it is what it is... We might be on the back foot again before the race, but we never give up. Hopefully tomorrow we have a bit more luck and can enjoy a good race – it would be good if some rain spices it all up! Our objective will be to finish within the top ten... We have to do some overtaking again, but I'm ready for it!

Overall I’m pretty happy with qualifying today, as I’ve had limited running here. It was important to get a lap in early, so I was unaffected by the first yellow flag for Ericsson. I was improving on my second lap, but then the yellow flags came out in sector 2 and I had to slow. Our long runs looked good this morning, so I’m looking forward to tomorrow.

To have a yellow flag on both my push laps is just the worst luck. I’ve never had a situation like that, so I was pretty shocked and disappointed by what happened today. Obviously I’ve been well within 107% during the weekend and I know the procedures, but even so, it’s not a great feeling. There hasn’t been much dry running so far, so we haven’t had the best preparation for a dry race, but I’m enjoying the track and I know there’s a lot more to come.

I’ve never rolled a racing car before and they say there’s a first time for everything. I’m feeling more disappointment than pain. I put two wheels on the grass and there was not much run off area at that point so it put me straight into the wall. I was pushing hard after a messy FP3 and this is the consequence of going over the limit. The car looks really bad and I’m sorry for the guys who have already had a tough couple of weeks and now they have even more work to do. Where would I have finished? I don’t know, but it should have been looking better than P10, because the car felt good in the fast sections, even though we lack the speed in a straight line. Tomorrow, we will try our best as usual.