02/09/2023
NEWS STORY
Yuki Tsunoda: "We struggled a lot yesterday, but straight away in FP3, the car felt much better.
"We made a big step and quite some changes to the car, and that worked well today. I'm pretty frustrated and disappointed with myself, because I think I could've done a better lap at the end. I apologise to the team, as I think there was the pace in the car to get to Q3. The team did well, and the track position was good in qualifying, I lost some time in a couple of places, so the frustration is more towards myself. For tomorrow, the race pace doesn't seem too bad, and we're just outside the top ten, so we just have to put it together, and points can be possible."
Liam Lawson: "Overall, we've been progressing over the sessions, building up my confidence. You can feel the limit, but it's also about knowing the step up in grip between the different compounds, if you make changes what it's going to do to the car, and that just takes some time. With both cars being so close to Q3, we definitely had the potential to make it, but unfortunately, Alonso went off the track right in front of me, so there was some gravel on my line. However, it would've been tight regardless. I'm happy to have made some improvements and I'm sure there's more to come. It's a good position to be starting in, and with both cars so close to each other, I'm positive about points for the team tomorrow."
Claudio Balestri (Chief Engineer - Vehicle Performance): "We weren't completely satisfied by our level of performance yesterday, the car was sliding more than we wanted, and in some corners, we were not very competitive. For all these reasons, we decided to make some changes to the setup overnight, to try and find a good compromise to remain competitive on the straight, which is always an important trade-off here in Monza. As for today's programme, in the morning session, we worked to verify the setup changes for different conditions and fuel loads. For the low fuel runs, we focused our attention on the mandatory hard and medium tyre compound for Q1 and Q2, to maximise the possibilities of doing well in these two qualifying sessions, and this approach paid off. The changes made overnight were positive, and this is why we were able to go to Q2 with both drivers in a very difficult session, where you need to manage the traffic, and the tow is important. We were competitive on the medium tyres in Q2 but were not fast enough to make it into Q3. The gaps were incredibly small, and our last laps were not perfect, so in the end, we finished in P11 with Yuki and P12 with Liam. Now, we need to switch our focus to tomorrow's race, where we will target some points."