30/07/2022
NEWS STORY
Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN had a strong showing at the Hungaroring, with Valtteri Bottas qualifying in eighth place for tomorrow's Hungarian Grand Prix, and Zhou Guanyu just outside the top ten in 12th place.
The team will line up on the grid confident in its chances for the race, the final one before the summer break.
Frederic Vasseur, Team Principal: "The team did a good job today and delivered a strong performance. Eighth place with Valtteri and Zhou missing on Q3 for the smallest margin, little more than 0.1s, is nearly as good a result as we would have hoped before the session and a good starting point for tomorrow. We showed good pace with both cars and we are confident we can do so tomorrow as well, when points are on offer. With one car in the top ten and one just outside, in P12, we are looking forward to the race. This is a circuit in which overtaking can be challenging: we are ready for a battle tomorrow and to give everything to bring home points."
Valtteri Bottas: "It is positive to be back in Q3, we finally got everything together and the results show for it. It has been a while since we have been there and it's good to be where we feel we belong. We were closer to Alpine than we thought, which is a positive, and it seems we made a bit of progress since the last race. In terms of race pace, I believe there is not really a big difference between the teams at the top of the midfield, which should make for a good battle tomorrow. Still, this is a difficult track on which to overtake, so it is good to start from the Top 10 and be able to fight for the points right for the start. Tomorrow will be all about having a good start off the line and choosing the right strategy: I'm looking forward to it."
Zhou Guanyu: "I am quite happy with how qualifying went today, especially taking into account the difficult conditions we faced this morning. We finally got back to Q2 with both cars, and it's been very intense as once again it was so close in the midfield. I was quite impressed with our pace today, as we seemed to be back on our levels after a couple of difficult weekends. Q3 wasn't too far from my reach, but I encountered some traffic on my out-lap and the tyres weren't ready, nevertheless I pulled together a good lap in the end and I'm happy about it. It looks like tomorrow won't be any hotter than today, so hopefully that puts us in a good position for the race, to try and fight for places and bring home some points."
Check out our Saturday gallery from the Hungaroring here.