10/10/2014
NEWS STORY
Daniil Kvyat: "It was a normal Friday and we worked on trying to find the best compromise for the general set up on this new track. Even though we were already looking quite promising today, hopefully we can do another good step forward for tomorrow and look even better. I had a good feeling with the car, which seems quite promising here. It was great to finally get out there and I enjoyed driving on this cool track a lot."
Jean-Eric Vergne: "It was a productive Friday. The team did a great job to arrive here with a car that was straight away well set up for this new track. I think we have a good car but today we didn't get the best out of the tyres. We still have some work to do tonight to understand their behavior and go quicker tomorrow."
Phil Charles (Chief Race Engineer): "A very interesting day. Both drivers settled in to the new track pretty well, so overall we are quite happy. I think our simulation work in advance was pretty good. The start set up really wasn't too far off and it was just a matter of little tweaks today, which is very positive. The big thing that everybody will have noticed is the fact that lap times were getting quicker and quicker through the runs so getting the tyre in the right window is the key. We'll do a bit more homework tonight to see if we can get it really good. Both drivers seem comfortable with the track, so it's just optimising the set up around the tyres."
Ricardo Penteado (Renault Sport F1 track support leader): "We enjoyed two very good, trouble-free practice sessions today. Both Daniil and Jean-Eric completed plenty of laps, were up to speed pretty quickly and finished inside the top-10 in both FP1 and FP2. Fuel consumption is high at Sochi, but our energy management looks spot-on and there shouldn't be any issues with the maximum 100kg fuel limit during the race. Completing plenty of laps and gathering lots of data is also vitally important when visiting a new circuit for the first time, so all in all I'm very pleased. I should also mention that it's great to be racing here with a Russian driver in the team. Daniil is certainly very motivated to put on a good show in front of his home crowd."
Check out our Friday gallery, here.