Fahrerstimmen – Tag 2

I’m very happy. Monza is always a special one and to secure pole position here in front of our tifosi, is an incredible feeling. Even more so after we struggled in Spa, another high-speed track with similar demands. We worked hard to make improvements and it looks like we have become more competitive again. I felt confident in the car from the first practice session on and our race pace was strong, so hopefully we can convert this pole into a victory tomorrow. I will give it everything.

Das Q1 begann gut, ich lag nur ein paar Zehntel hinter Ferrari und hoffte, dass wir dort bleiben würden. Dann lief uns die Session davon, um ehrlich zu sein, und mir fehlten am Ende 1,4 Sekunden. Wir sind auf dem letzten Run ein Risiko eingegangen, um einen Satz neuer Soft-Reifen für morgen aufzusparen, und ich bin froh, dass weder Lando noch Fernando uns überholt haben, denn das war letztlich der Kampf um den zweiten Platz in der Startaufstellung. Im Hinblick auf das Rennen müssen wir uns auf uns selbst konzentrieren - es wird schwer, Max hinter uns zu halten, Charles startet vorne, und dann kommen Sergio, Carlos und Lewis von hinten. Wir müssen unser eigenes Rennen fahren, uns darauf konzentrieren, auf den Podiumsplätzen zu bleiben und einen guten Kampf liefern.

Very happy with today. Very happy. I think it was the best we could have achieved. We were so close to being ahead of the Mercedes but to not be far behind is also a very good achievement. A few people have grid penalties tomorrow, so that gives us a better position. Hopefully we can take advantage of that, have a clean race and get some good points.

I’m happy with Q3, happy to be up the pointy end again. It’s been a while, so I'm pleased with that. The Q3 lap was certainly a bit of a handful, just trying to get those last few tenths out of it. It still is tricky for me to feel the car on the limit and know what’s going to be around the corner – but I was happy with Q1 and Q2, I think I put in some good laps. We gain some spots on the starting grid due to penalties tomorrow. We’ve ended qualifying in a better place than where we’ve been this weekend, so I'm happy to put it together. I think we made some good changes, so hopefully we have a fast race car.

Overall, I am very pleased to make it into Q3. There was still some sliding in the high-speed corners, so I couldn’t fully commit, but the track is amazing to drive. We made some changes after yesterday and they seem to have paid off, but there is still more to get out of the car for tomorrow. There are some faster cars starting behind us tomorrow, due to a number of drivers having penalties, but we’ve seen that it might be more difficult to overtake in the race compared to past years, because the slipstream effect is less with the new cars. Our aim is to stay in the points and, as we’ve seen in the past, anything can happen here.

It’s a little disappointing to finish tenth in Q3 today. My last lap time was also deleted for track limits, which I’m told was good enough for eighth position before the penalties were applied to others. On the whole, we seemed to be lacking a little performance in Qualifying compared to the rest of the weekend. The car has felt good and seems strong on race pace, but we have to be mindful of several fast cars starting behind us. We’ve scored points in ten races in a row, so let’s make it eleven tomorrow

I think qualifying went well. The Ferraris have looked strong all weekend, so we knew it would be close today. We set up the car for the race, opting for a little bit more downforce; over one qualifying lap it wasn’t the best, but I think tomorrow it will be strong. Regardless, we were still quite close so that’s a positive. It will be an interesting battle tomorrow; I’ll try and stay out of trouble and just make my way forward. We won’t be taking any crazy risks though, I know that we don’t need to win every race from now until the end of the season but if I clear all the cars in front of me, then I will of course go for the win.

First, I just want to say I feel bad for Alex and hope that his health and recovery will be quick. Nevertheless, it was a great opportunity for myself, however, it’s challenging to just jump in like that. Overall, I’m happy with how it went but definitely feel there was more in it. Unfortunately, I picked up a lot of rear locking in my lap, but generally, it was a positive session. With the grid penalties, it’s positive to be starting further up the grid - I have some homework to do tonight but it’s great to get the call up.

I think we came away with a good result, even though we were under some pressure as we only had two sets of new tyres. We were strong in Q1, while Q2 has been quite difficult for me: we struggled a bit more to get the balance right, and a flat spot on my tyre did not help. It was unfortunate as I think we were looking good and there was much more to get out from the car. Nevertheless, due to all the penalties to other drivers, we should be starting in the top ten, and it’s always nicer to be a little further up on this track. I am looking forward to tomorrow, as hopefully we will have more opportunities throughout the race.

Firstly, I'm wishing Alex a quick recovery and hope to see him back soon. I locked up into the first corner and didn’t get a lap on my second set of tyres.
It’s frustrating but I’m where I expected to be as a result. It’s one of the trickiest corners for our car. Looking ahead to tomorrow, we’re quick in a straight line but we’ll lose time gained in the corners, so it’s going to be about how that balances out. We’ll be starting further forward due to a few penalties, so we’ll see what happens.

I was happy with the lap that I did today, which was a reasonable effort from my side. I only had one attempt in the end because of the bodywork coming loose during the first run, which meant that I was unable to get into a rhythm. Generally, this weekend has not been easy for us. At this track, for some reason, we are just not particularly competitive. But it is a new day tomorrow and we will push hard to make progress. We will gain some grid positions from others taking penalties, so we should start in the middle of the grid. We are usually more competitive on Sundays so let us see what we can achieve tomorrow.

We always knew that this would not be our strongest track and I think that showed with today’s result. Monza is a very different circuit to the tracks we have visited recently, so hopefully this is a bit of an outlier. We seem to have a bit too much drag on the car for this high-speed circuit. I am sure we will have stronger performances later on in the season. We will gain grid positions through other drivers taking penalties, so things could work out better for us tomorrow. We will try and do what we can to race for points.

It is still a good result today and we can fight for it tomorrow. With the race pace we have, we can close up the gap, so I am looking forward to it. It wasn’t a great lap for me, but it didn’t feel bad either, now we need to maximise for tomorrow and focus. We knew the Ferraris were going to be very fast around here so their result wasn’t much of a surprise. I think in the race they will also be strong. We are lacking a bit of pace at the moment so there are a few things to review from today before the race - we have to make the most of what I have. The DRS straights can be very painful around here, you can sit for a couple of laps and that can impact your race a lot. It will be difficult to pass, you must have a good strategy and use your pace properly, that will be very important to progress.

It wasn’t a perfect qualifying session for us today. In the end we just missed out on Q3, after a sub-optimal Q2. We lost the rear of the car a couple of times and any small mistake at Monza costs time. The various engine penalties have really shaken up the grid for tomorrow, so let’s see what happens. It will be an exciting race tomorrow with potential to get in the top ten and we will be pushing hard to finish the weekend strongly and to score points.”

I am pretty happy with today’s performance: I think we got everything we could out of this session. Our objective was to be ahead of Magnussen and Schumacher, as they had the same amount of penalties as us and we were fighting for position – and we did it. We knew we had a big penalty today, so we focused completely on setting the car up for the race – and still got very close to a spot in Q3. I feel we have made a good improvement compared to the last couple of rounds and we should be in a position to fight for points, even with the penalty. Our race pace is good, and hopefully we can have some nice battles tomorrow.

It’s been as hard as we expected. I think we were close to getting into Q2, and if that had happened – if my lap time hadn’t been deleted, we would’ve been very surprised to get through. For tomorrow, it’s always interesting when there are lots of cars out of position.

We’ve done very few laps and I think that’s the main reason why the weekend has been compromised. These things happen, it’s nobody’s fault and at the end of the day we win and we lose together. Now it’s a matter of who we decide to fight with, but there might be a few cars ahead of us that could be in our window. I haven’t done any race runs yet so it will be a race with some improvisation.

It was a good qualifying session from the beginning, with strong laps in Q1 and Q2. Then on the final attempts we also did very good laps, although on the last run, my track position was not the best behind Pierre (Gasly), as he was doing very fast out laps and we couldn’t get any tow. Still, it’s great for Ferrari to start on pole here at Monza so congrats to Charles and the entire team. We can be happy with the performance we have shown today and I think it’s a good testimony of the hard work that has been carried out in Maranello. I hope we can stage a good recovery tomorrow and for sure I’m going to push flat out to make up as many positions as possible. The support from the tifosi in the grandstands has been absolutely incredible all weekend and we’ll do our best to gift them with an exciting race.

Von meiner Seite aus war es ein ordentliches Qualifying, aber nicht mein bestes. Wir waren heute nicht so schnell wie die Spitze, also konnte ich nicht viel mehr tun. Mit diesem niedrigen Abtriebs-Niveau scheinen wir weniger konkurrenzfähig zu sein und im Vergleich zu den Teams um uns herum an Pace zu verlieren. Morgen wird es für uns schwierig sein, von hinten zu starten, denn der DRS-Effekt ist nicht groß, und ich erwarte, dass viele Autos in DRS-Zügen festhängen werden. Es könnte also ein frustrierender Tag für uns werden - aber ich werde versuchen, positiv zu bleiben und alles zu geben, was ich habe.

Of course, we have the penalties this weekend, so our focus has been on our race pace rather than Qualifying, but I’m happy with the short-run pace we’ve had this weekend, I’ve felt quite comfortable in the car and we looked strong in Q1. I stayed in the car for Q2 in case I needed to help out my teammate – as tows can sometimes be useful around this track – but we decided that this wasn’t necessary for Pierre in the end, so we didn’t run. I will now focus on tomorrow’s race, it’s going to be difficult but it’s possible to overtake here in Monza and there’s a lot of people out of place tomorrow, so you never know what will happen.