Fahrerstimmen – Tag 3

Es bedeutet mir wirklich sehr viel, hier in Monza gewonnen zu haben. Die Zuschauer waren das gesamte Wochenende über unglaublich und natürlich ganz besonders bei der Siegerehrung. Dieser Sieg ist etwas ganz Besonderes für mich. Dort oben zu stehen und zusammen mit tausenden von Menschen zu singen, brachte mir eine Gänsehaut ein. Das Rennen verlief aus meiner Sicht perfekt. Nach einem guten Start konnte ich den Vorsprung auf meine Verfolger kontrollieren. Unser Auto war am ganzen Wochenende super und ich möchte dem gesamten Team dafür danken. Jetzt freue ich mich auf Singapur. Dort erlebten wir im vergangenen Jahr unser schwächstes Rennen. Hoffentlich haben wir unsere Lehren daraus gezogen und können in diesem Jahr zurückschlagen!

Es ist ein harter Schlag, wenn du ein Rennen wegen eines schlechten Starts verlierst. Danach ging es nur noch darum, auf dem ersten Stint auf die Reifen zu achten. Ich war froh, dass ich nach dem ersten Stopp wieder bis auf Rang zwei nach vorne gekommen war. Ich gab weiter alles und kam bis ins Ziel bis auf 15 Sekunden an Nico heran. Ich bin mit meiner Performance an diesem Wochenende zufrieden, aber nach so einem unglaublichen Qualifying wie gestern ist es natürlich enttäuschend, daraus kein Kapital geschlagen zu haben. Ich bin sicher, dass wir bis Singapur daran arbeiten werden, was am Start passiert ist.

"Of course I am very happy for all the team. It is a very special race for us, to stand on the podium here in Monza, is just great. But for sure you are always aiming for the top step, so well done to our rivals, they have been in a league on their own in the race. Yet, we tried our optimum, this is the perfect result for us, the whole weekend has been very smooth, no issues with the car. We brought an engine update, so grazie anche to the guys at Maranello, for their support. I feel things are changing: it will still take a little bit, but we are heading the right way. And on a day like this, you realize that life is to enjoy, to get so much support is just unbelievalble. I feel we have the best fans in the world, it is difficult to find the right words. This podium here, it's not the Adriatic sea, it is the sea of tifosi.. We had a rough season, we had high expectations, we have put ourselves on high pressure, we have also done mistakes, but the most important thing is that we stay a team, that we stay together. We have a lot of races ahead, we know we have a good car, unfortunately not yet quick enough for being able to say, here 'we have the best car', but I am sure that one day we will be."

"I think that today we were closer to our rivals than we expected after qualifying. Obviously we were on different tactics, but we did the correct things, the right choice with tyres and the fastest race we could. We had a pretty good speed but we were not fast enough for gaining a better position. Fourth position is not exactly what we were looking for, but this is not the easiest circuit for us against the Mercedes, and we did our maximum. With Sebastian we were more or less driving behind each other and when you race against your teammate there's not much that you can do, we both know what the other guy is going to do. After the start it was a bit tricky, I got close after the first pit stop, but then he was able to pull away. In the last few weekends it seems that we are going in the right direction, now we have to keep trying and improving doing our maximum. Every race is a different story, a small mistake here and there from somebody might give us a chance, who knows.."

“You hope for a podium every race but realistically, coming here, we thought Ferrari would have an edge on us. We also thought Williams and Force India would be strong and we targeted fifth place. I just missed out yesterday in Qualifying but managed to make it happen today and for us to finish in fifth and seventh represents Championship damage limitation here at Monza. I was pretty close to (Valtteri) Bottas in the middle of the race and knew I could race hard from that position. It was a really enjoyable overtake (on Bottas). I have a three hour drive home tonight and didn’t want to spend the whole journey regretting not trying it. He is a fair racer and had seen me in the mirrors so I knew he wouldn’t turn in, so I had a go. It was great fun and felt nice to come from so far back and make it stick. We altered the strategy a bit which meant I had the supersofts on at that stage, so great work by the team to give me the chance to make the move. Our performance so far this season and the result we have achieved here makes me really excited heading into Singapore where I think we can challenge for the top spots.”

I was personally expecting a bit more from today. I set myself a target of finishing on the podium, but we didn’t quite have the pace which meant that I had to push the tyre a little bit more in every stint just to secure my position on track. This meant that towards the end of the stint I was struggling a bit. The pure pace wasn’t there today, but overall we leave Monza with a positive result for the team, taking back fourth place in the Constructors’ Championship.This gives us a bit of confidence and shows that we can definitely keep hold of fourth if we keep doing the right things.

“I went into anti-stall at the start. I don’t know what happened there so I have to analyse that. After that it was just very difficult, because you have to push harder on the tyres to get past people and that compromises your strategy, but in the end our last stint was very positive. I think we did the best we could with the tyres we had so we can be very happy about that. The car behaved very well today even though this track is not our favourite. We’re definitely looking forward to Singapore and hopefully we can put in a strong performance there.”

“I didn’t really enjoy myself out there today: it was a fairly lonely race for most of it, but at least it gave me a chance to look after my tyres. I think we got the maximum result we could hope for because we didn’t have the pace to achieve more. We tried an aggressive strategy, with a very early second stop, to try and cover Verstappen, but it turned out to be too early and in the end we had a lot of pressure from Massa. It was very important to keep in front of him and bring home as many points as we possibly could. We always knew it would be a challenging race and it’s shown that we need to keep working hard. I think we can fight back strongly in Singapore because it’s a very different kind of circuit compared to Monza and we’ve performed well on street circuits so far this year.”

I think it was a good race apart from the fact that we didn’t have the pace we expected to have with the option tyres. My race started after I changed on to the supersoft tyres and my pace was really good. If I could have got a bit more out of my tyres then it could have been better but I’m pleased that we managed to get enough points to take fourth place back in the Constructors’ Championship.

“My initial start off the line was okay, but Max [Verstappen] in front of me really bogged down so I had to react and turn around him. That really hurt my traction and I lost all the drive going forward, which is why I lost a few positions. Later in the lap, I was side-by-side through turn four with Felipe [Massa] and was on the outside line for turn five. Felipe jumped over the kerb, gave me a little hit, and pushed me wide on the exit, allowing Fernando [Alonso] to get ahead. So it was not a great first lap. Then, in the first stint, it wasn’t easy to overtake and I was stuck behind Fernando until the first pit stop. The second half of the race was actually quite lonely for me, but the damage was done by losing so much ground on lap one. So I’m slightly disappointed with the outcome because I believed we would be more competitive here. We need to learn the lessons, understand where we can improve and come out much stronger in Singapore.”

“To be fair, I think we were just lacking a little bit of speed in the race to make the points. We tried a very aggressive one-stop strategy. I had a bit of graining on the softs in the first stint through those last few laps. That cost us a few seconds, but I don’t think I could have gotten the 12 seconds needed to get to P10 in the end. That was about the maximum today. We just need to learn what we can do better for the next race. I’m now looking ahead to Singapore. It’s one of the best races of the season.”

“There were a few mistakes on the first lap. I got a bad start, then, at the first Lesmo, one of the Saubers pushed me wide, then forced me off the circuit and into the gravel. I was last at the end of the first lap… “After that, I couldn’t have wished for anything better: I had a lot of fun out there and pulled off some good overtaking moves, including one around the outside of Parabolica – something that doesn’t happen very often! “I’m very happy with my performance. To come through and finish 12th isn’t great, but it wasn’t too bad considering the first lap. There’ll always be ifs and buts: if I hadn’t gone off on the first lap, I think we could have got into the points today. “Singapore will definitely suit us better than here – this is our toughest circuit of the year, so to be that close to the top 10 wasn’t too bad, really.”

“It was a very disappointing start to the race losing a lot of positions. It was very tough to recover, but I did my best. I struggled in the first stint with the overall pace, starting with the scrubbed tires from qualifying and fighting with people which were on new tires. It wasn’t very easy, but we kept ourselves together and pushed really hard to recover everything we could, but what we lost in the beginning was too much to get back to where we started. Now we’ll look ahead to Singapore and we’ll be focusing on that to come back stronger.”

“We didn’t do a perfect race today – we made some mistakes here and there, including having a problem in the first pit stop, when the green light didn’t work. We lost a little bit of time there which probably compromised the stint. “We didn’t really have the pace to be in the points today, so finishing 11th or 14th didn’t really make much of a difference. But at least we finished the race on a positive note, by setting the fastest lap. “We fitted new tyres for the last two laps and I just went out and maximised the grip. It doesn’t make for much difference – it’s only good for the stats – as we were basically never in the running for points today. “This was a circuit where we always knew we wouldn’t be competitive, but I think good times are coming our way from now on, as most of the remaining tracks on the calendar should better suit our car.”

"I think we tried everything we could today to make it into the points, but when you just don't have the pace, it's impossible. We had decided to go for a one-stop strategy and at one point it looked possible, but in the end I was losing too much time so we had to pit for a second time... Not the ideal race, but all I can say is that we extracted the maximum out of the car today and in the end a P15 was the most we could achieve. Here the car behaved better than last week in Spa, so this is something positive for us – the last three races have been very tricky, racing at very power-dependent circuits, and this has made it very difficult to fight... Hopefully in Singapore this situation changes a bit and we can get back to where we deserve to be."

„Ein durchaus respektables Rennen, wie ich finde. Natürlich ist es enttäuschend, dass wir im Mittelfeld nicht weiter vorne mitkämpfen konnten. Noch dazu, wo wir gegenüber den Rennen vor der Sommerpause einen Schritt nach vorne gemacht haben. Dennoch waren wir hier nicht dort, wo wir sein wollten. Das Autodromo von Monza ist bezüglich seiner Charakteristik einmalig, weil es ein Hochgeschwindigkeits-Kurs ist. Beim nächsten Rennen in Singapur ist wieder mehr Abtrieb nötig, deshalb wird es interessant sein, welches Potenzial wir dort aus unserem Paket herausholen können.“

“My start was okay but there were incidents everywhere… I had a better start than the Saubers ahead of me, which meant going around them, then another car on the grid. After that, I was able to build-up the momentum into turn two but had to avoid a spinning car by going on the grass. From then on, it was a quiet race with just a bit of early action with one of the Manors. It’s a shame that we didn’t get a good result today but we still learn more about the car every weekend and this race was no exception.”

Esteban, good to see you take the chequered flag again, but that wasn’t really the objective here, was it? “No, the objective was to take the chequered flag, but in a much stronger position. It was a long, tough Grand Prix from where I started. We were on the Medium tyre for a very long stint – 32 laps - and none of the opportunities that we hoped might change the face of the race happened. At the end, on the Soft tyre, we were really on the limit. So it’s good to finish, especially after the problem for Pascal’s car. That’s two race distances with a lot of learnings about the tyres and managing races, but now I’m ready to use that experience to fight for something more. I think we were capable of much better here, so it’s a shame.” So, we pack up in Monza and head east for the next few rounds of the Championship. Europe was short and probably a little bitter-sweet for you, but good things ahead to look forward to. “The last two races have had their difficulties, but they were also my first two races in Formula 1. I achieved my dream in Spa, after a long road to get here, and when things did go our way this weekend, we saw that the car is improving, same for me. I’m disappointed today, but I’m looking forward to better things in the seven remaining races. It will come good for me soon.”

"Not the race we wanted. We had an issue with the floor, which got damaged after Turn 1, as I was sandwiched by a few cars, and we therefore lost a lot of downforce... A part from this, the battery was also constantly overheating, so we decided to retire the car. We knew it was going to be difficult here, but it's a shame to have to end my race early... We just need to be patient and hopefully the next tracks will suit us better."

„Ein enttäuschendes, frühes Ende des Rennens für uns. Andererseits ist mir erneut ein sehr guter Start gelungen, bei dem ich vier Positionen nach vorne rücken konnte. Schade, dass ich das Rennen nach der Kollision mit Jolyon (Palmer) beenden musste, weil das Auto so stark beschädigt wurde. Nun hoffe ich natürlich auf ein problemfreies Wochenende beim nächsten Grand Prix in Singapur.“

“I had a really good start and made a lot of positions. I was alongside Nasr through turn one with no problem then he decided to run me off the road in turn two. I can’t explain why he did that or imagine what he was thinking. I went as far off the track as I could without risking a spin from the gravel and he still made contact with me. There was no racing room and both our races ended way too early. For me I feel I’m driving better than ever and I’m hopeful that will show in Singapore.”

Pascal, terrible luck for you, after such a promising weekend. No need to ask how you feel. “Pretty disappointed, of course. When I heard my engineer telling me to “Stop the car. Stop the car”, I couldn’t believe it. I had to check what I was hearing. Of course, it was for good reason, to protect the car, so I knew what I had to do – I just didn’t want to believe it, I guess.” “The team is making really positive steps with the car, though the positive signs must make today’s retirement all the more tough to take. Splitting two McLarens in qualifying, the expectation that you can fight for Q2, if not higher, and fending off the competition in qualifying and in the race. “Yes, today’s situation is difficult to take, knowing what is possible from the car and having pushed so hard all weekend again. But I know the team will want to sort the problems out as quickly as possible; it’s disappointing for everyone and we can’t afford for a good result to get away from us again if we are to protect our position in the championship. We’ll come back fighting in Singapore, a race I’m really excited about. I hope we can make it happen for us there.”