30/06/2018
NEWS STORY
Esteban Ocon: "A place in Q3 was just out of reach today. We were missing a tenth or two to make the difference because the middle of the grid is very close. It's not been the easiest weekend and we have struggled to find the pace, especially over a single lap. I think the developments we have coming for the future races will give us the boost we need. The positive thing about P11 is that we have a free choice of tyres tomorrow and can start the race on new tyres. For tomorrow I'm only looking forward and aiming for points."
Sergio Perez: "I am disappointed to go out of qualifying so early today. It was definitely not the result we were expecting. We were close to making Q2 but in the end we fell just short. I found so much traffic in the last sector of my final and the time I lost kept me out of Q2. We didn't maximise our performance and paid the price for it. With these small margins, we had to be perfect to progress and that wasn't the case today. I feel we made some good steps forward with the car this weekend, even though we weren't able to show it today, and we will give everything to try and recover some points tomorrow."
Otmar Szafnauer: "On such a short lap we always see a very tight grid with small margins between the cars, especially in the middle of the pack. P11 represents a decent effort by Esteban and keeps us in the fight for points tomorrow. Sergio has been struggling more with the balance of the car and he was caught out by the traffic this afternoon. With a grid penalty for Leclerc, we expect Sergio to move up a position to start from P16. We have solid race pace so I think there's all to play for tomorrow and I will be disappointed if we don't come away with some points."
Check out our Saturday gallery from Spielberg, here.