18/03/2022
NEWS STORY
Pierre Gasly: "We've had two very different sessions today; we topped the timings in FP1 and then in the second session we were P13, so two very contrasting outcomes. I think purely for us the hotter track conditions helped, the car really seemed to click, but tonight we struggled massively in the cold. We need to look through everything and understand what happened, especially as Qualifying and the race are both at night here in Bahrain. I think our long run pace was slightly better than the shorter runs, but still we've got a lot of work to do to fully understand our performance in these conditions."
Yuki Tsunoda: "We started quite well today with FP1, but in the second session we started to struggle a bit. We'll have to work hard tonight to see what the limitations were today and see how we can improve for tomorrow. We've made a big step up after the tests and I'm much more comfortable in the car, but we've still got a couple of tenths to find and then I hope we'll be closer to that top group. We've got one practice session left so we've still got to time to make some improvements ahead of Qualifying."
Jonathan Eddolls (Chief Race Engineer): "We hit the ground running in FP1 but then had mixed fortunes going into FP2, where we were not able to follow the changing track conditions and both cars suffered with a lack of grip and difficult balance. Not only did we struggle more, it also appeared other teams made quite a step up in performance between FP1 and FP2, which emphasised the gap. Fundamentally there isn't anything wrong with the car, as we showed in FP1, so we have a lot of work ahead of us tonight to ensure we understand the FP2 performance and make the relevant changes to the car for tomorrow. This is particularly important for Qualifying, as the track temperature will be similar to this evening."
Check out our Friday gallery from Bahrain, here.