25/09/2021
NEWS STORY
Lance Stroll: "I am happy that we made it into Q3 and P8 is a good starting position to fight for points tomorrow. We made a decent step forward compared to yesterday and the team did a good job in challenging conditions. I do think there was more on the table on the last lap, though. What affected the lap most was traffic in the last sector [caused by Sergio Perez] and my lap time was hurt under braking into Turns 13, 14 and 15. I also had issues with Daniel [Ricciardo] getting in my way in Q1. It was a bit frustrating, but we will look ahead to tomorrow now. It is a long run to the first braking point here and there is a lot of slipstreaming, so let us see what happens on Sunday."
Sebastian Vettel: "We definitely had the potential to have a much better result today. I think we had the pace to easily progress to Q3, but I had traffic on my final run [from Yuki Tsunoda] and I just missed out. I am annoyed with myself because I should have put in a better time the lap before as well. It means we are starting on the edge of the top 10 and unfortunately overtaking is not so easy here."
Otmar Szafnauer, CEO & Team Principal: "Lance did a superb job to qualify eighth but, had he not lost a significant amount of time behind Checo [Perez] in sector three on his fastest Q3 lap, he would have qualified fourth. That is frustrating, but it shows the pace of our car and the brilliance of Lance in changeable weather conditions. He will be aiming to bag a lot of points tomorrow. In Q2, Sebastian, too, was hindered by traffic - [Yuki] Tsunoda this time - and the result was that he failed to get through to Q3 by the tiny margin of just 0.05sec. But he will start the race from the clean side of the track and, like Lance, he will be aiming to score points tomorrow."