Fahrerstimmen – Tag 2

It was quite a crazy qualifying, very hectic and slippery in some places. I had a little ‘inchident’ in the pit lane, I understeered as I turned and the car just went straight - I think there was quite a bit of damage. That aside, very happy. Equally, I’m very happy for McLaren, you could see how excited everyone was in that garage, they’ve worked so hard, it’s also great for the British fans too. I’m expecting the Ferraris and Mercedes to be more competitive during the race. As for us, we know that we have a good race car and I’m already looking forward to it. I don’t mind if it’s wet tomorrow, in FP3 we were very fast in the wet so I don’t think we need to worry.

That was close! Two-tenths to P1 in Q3, is pretty insane. My last lap was a good lap. I could hear Zak on the radio on the in-lap, which is the best thing ever. I’m grateful. For us to achieve second and third is pretty amazing for the whole team, with all the hard work that we've been putting in, especially to do it here in Silverstone. To do that with the chrome livery at our home race, for the team, for myself, is amazing. Big thanks to the whole crowd here, they’re amazing. It's been a very special day for us. I look forward to tomorrow.

I’m very, very, very happy. I mean, what a qualifying session. The car was a rocket ship in Q2 and Q3, I feel like I put a pretty good lap together. It’s a massive result for the team and the hard work that’s gone into bringing upgrades to the car. To have both of us up here is a mega result. Now we've just got to try and stay there for tomorrow. We know that will be a challenge, but we’re looking forward to it.

A pretty good qualifying, considering that I struggled a bit in the last few races in mixed conditions on slick tyres. I felt good today, because it seems that the hard work I’ve put in to improve this has paid off. I didn’t put the perfect lap together in Q3 as I lost grip in turn 15, so a front row position was not possible today.
It’s nice to see McLaren be so quick and I expect an exciting race tomorrow with all of us so close together. We don’t have any race trim data on my side because I missed out on FP2, but we maximised every session since then and are in a decent starting position, so everything is possible tomorrow.

It was not a bad Saturday overall after a very challenging Quali. The field was very tight and the conditions were changing all the time, so to produce a solid session like we did was not easy.
Tomorrow we can expect a nice battle with the cars around us so I expect an intense race. We’ll give absolutely everything to bring home a good result.

It was an exciting session; I really enjoy these conditions. I’m always confident that I can do a good job and put the laps in when needed. It was stressful at times, but I felt comfortable with our pace in Q1 and Q2. My last lap in Q3 was strong, but it was frustrating to see how close we were to being a couple of positions further forward. I was a little bit disappointed not to achieve this but we’re in a decent place for tomorrow. The Team did a good job of improving the car overnight and I’m excited to see what we can do in the Grand Prix. We believe we have stronger race pace than on the single lap, so I’m confident that we can move forward.

Once again, the energy from the fans today has been amazing. You really feel the support from the stands and it’s incredible to see how they are backing the Team and us as drivers. It’s a special weekend and we can hopefully do a good job tomorrow and challenge for the podium.

We weren’t quite quick enough today unfortunately. The conditions were tricky out there but there was still an element of fun to it, as we tried to get on top of the tyres. There were some moments where it looked like we had the potential to challenge further forward, but then we fell back a little. We seem to struggle on the single lap more than we do on the race pace, so we will see what we can do tomorrow. If we can progress forward, then that would be amazing. Hopefully we can put some pressure on the cars ahead and get into a battle with them.

It’s been an amazing weekend but it’s funny when you finish in Q3, with P8 and you’re disappointed. We have to be realistic but it’s been great so far. In Qualifying, the session was going quite smoothly but, as the track dried out, corner speeds picked up and track evolution came in. We started to get quite a bit of degradation through the lap, even front deg, so we need to go away and understand that but, by the time I got to Q3, I was struggling a little bit with those combined factors. We’ve been really on top of it since the start of the weekend and I got into rhythm very quickly and adapted well to the changes, so we really hit the ground running. I think we ended up where we expected to be but I think if you told us we’d be here at the beginning of the weekend, we wouldn’t believe you.

It’s not the Qualifying we wanted in what was a challenging session in drying conditions. There is still a long race ahead of us tomorrow and our Sunday pace is normally a strong point of this car. We still achieved another Q3 result, but we need to keep understanding our car at different circuits. The weather tomorrow may also be changeable, as it was today, so we need to remain focused and see what we can do in race conditions.

That was a very challenging Qualifying to manage with the varying conditions. That said, when it is like that it’s often very exciting on-track and it certainly was enjoyable at the wheel. While I’m pleased to be in Q3 again, I’m disappointed we weren’t able to qualify any higher up than tenth place. We know the areas where we are lacking performance and we have to keep pushing hard as a team to find improvements to our package. Tomorrow, we will give it our all. The start of the race is going to be critical to make up some places and I’m confident we can come away with points on the board.

It was tricky obviously with the damp and wet patches, it’s quite sketchy, and it can go wrong but it didn’t. I think it was a good qualifying and I feel like I squeezed everything out of it. It was close with Alpine but not having DRS actually hurt us quite a bit. I think we’re a bit more ‘draggy’ and have more downforce than other cars, so missing DRS wasn’t ideal for us.

I think more was possible in Qualifying today. The red flag forced us to run a third set of tyres in Q1, which meant we didn’t have a new set in Q2 and that put us on the back foot in comparison to others. It’s a long race tomorrow and the AMR23 is feeling good, so I’ll be doing my best to fight through the pack and put on a good show for the home fans.

It’s been a frustrating day and a missed opportunity for us in Qualifying. It’s always disappointing not to make Q3, especially as we had the pace to do so. The conditions were not easy but we had been managing it very well. In Q2, it was not an ideal start to my final push lap as I braked on the wet side of the track alongside Lance [Stroll] and then spent my lap behind Charles [Leclerc], which cost us time. There are plenty of things for us to review from today, however, I’m feeling ready to make up some ground in tomorrow’s race.

For me, the first goal of this weekend was to get into Q2, and I achieved that. It was a tricky session all in all. We can’t catch a break from mixed conditions at the moment. We knew it was going to be a lot closer coming into qualifying than we saw in practice. It’s a shame that I didn’t have a new set of tyres at the end of Q2 as I think that probably cost us the chance of transferring to Q3. At the end of the day, the car was in a good place and we’re making steps in the right direction. I’m happy with the steps that I’m making this weekend. I still have plenty of steps to take which is clear to me. As long as I’m moving in the right direction that’s the positive part and we can build off that to have a good race tomorrow. It won’t be easy starting 14th with a lot of quick cars around us but we’ll do our best.

Today was quite disappointing. The red flag lasted a lot longer than we initially thought it would so we lost some heat on the tyres and couldn’t get enough temperature back into them. We also struggled with the weather. The changing conditions made things a lot trickier, so we ended up having a poor qualifying. We had a good session yesterday so, for now, we need to look forward to tomorrow and just aim to get any many points as possible. It’s going to be difficult to come through the field but we will try our very best.

I ended up very close to Q2 again, it’s frustrating and a shame, but I'm happy with my performance. Track evolution was high and almost fully dry in the end, but the team did a good job with the strategy. We tried many different things with the new upgrade, and compared to yesterday, the car felt better. I feel more support in the places I need, especially in the low-speed corners, and more rotation in the high-speed corners, which we were aiming for. There is room for improvement, but we're still trying to understand the car's behaviour more. I reset myself and do whatever I can tomorrow to extract as much performance from the car and finish as high as possible.

I think we had the potential to improve our performance this weekend, but unfortunately, today has been quite tricky for our team and we couldn’t maximise our chances. I had no running time during the final practice session because of a technical issue that the team promptly investigated and addressed, allowing me to get back on track ahead of qualifying. There, too, my running chances were limited, and I struggled with finding enough grip, eventually getting only one timed lap which wasn’t enough to make it through to Q2. We are of course disappointed not to have had an actual shot at moving forward, but our main aim now will be to regroup and come prepared ahead of tomorrow.

Today's qualifying was a very tricky session, with changing conditions as the rain was coming. We did a decent lap at the beginning of qualifying, but towards the end, when it became a one-lap shootout, my tyres were very cold. I didn’t have the confidence and temperature to push and attack as required, making a mistake in the last corner where I out braked myself and went deep, losing a lot of time there. During the session, we were more competitive and in the mix, so I feel our final lap wasn't entirely representative. In these changing conditions, we maybe didn’t put it together when it mattered. We did some long runs in practice, but it’s certainly not going to be easy tomorrow. A big part of the track is high-speed, so it’s difficult to overtake and follow, so a little rain is welcome because it might bring some opportunities.

It just doesn’t seem to be my year this one so far, but this is where you show experience, stay cool and keep fighting. Everything switched off in the car, I had no power steering, nothing, I don’t know what it was in Q1. Until that point it felt good compared to the rest of the weekend, I was on a decent lap to improve there – on the one I stopped. There was still time on the clock so I don’t know if that would have been the last one.

Today’s results are very disappointing, as it seemed we actually had a real chance to make it into the top ten. I started to lose power on the final inlap, and then the engine stopped. We eventually figured out it was a technical issue with fuel in the car, and we are already working to address that and make sure it doesn’t happen again. Sadly, this means we’ll be starting at the back of the grid in the race, which is not where we would have deserved to be looking at our pace. Still, tomorrow will be a long day and, as always, the weather could add one more element of unpredictability: the car felt better than yesterday, and we have slightly better pace compared to previous events, so our aim will be to make the most out of it and fight as hard as we can through the field.