USA Grand Prix – Saturday 22nd October 2016. Austin, Texas

Sauber F1 Team

Sauber were only just ahead of the Manors in FP3, but in qualifying they showed more pace, with Ericsson finishing ahead of Grosjean’s Haas and Button’s McLaren by making Q2. Unfortunately he had no fresh supersoft tyres to use, but 16th was still a positive result. Nasr complained about issues with his brakes, and will line up on the back row of the grid.

Marcus Ericsson, 16th, 1:39.356: “It has been a tricky Friday, as I was not feeling confident in the car. We had quite a lot of work to do overnight to find a better direction for today. We definitely made steps in the right direction for FP3. For qualifying I felt even better in the car. That was a good job by everyone. Talking about qualifying, I am satisfied with my performance. My lap in Q1, that at that time was P14, was really good. In Q2 we did not have a fresh set of supersoft tyres to put on. Anyway, P16 is a decent position to start the race from, and I hope we can again take up the fight with the mid-field in the race tomorrow.”

Felipe Nasr, 21st, 1:38.583: “It is certainly not the qualifying result we can be satisfied with, especially when keeping in mind yesterday’s results. I was pretty satisfied with the balance of the car in both free practice sessions, but in qualifying there was something wrong with the car. We have to investigate and see what we can improve on for tomorrow.”

Haas F1 Team

After the highs of Japen, with two cars into Q3 for the first time, qualifying was disappointing for the Haas team at their home race. Grosjean exited in Q1, complaining about a lack of downforce. Gutierrez made Q2 but could only manage 14th.

Romain Grosjean, 17th, 1:38.308: “We’re missing downforce here and paying a heavy price for it. This is a track that needs a lot of downforce and we just don’t have enough. Low speed is very difficult for us. We were struggling here yesterday with some pieces coming off and we didn’t learn much on track. Today is a bit of a summary of yesterday. We’ve been on the back foot since the beginning and we just haven’t had the grip. We’re good with the top speed but, unfortunately, the pace of the car overall doesn’t look good for tomorrow.”

Esteban Gutierrez, 14th, 1:37.773: “It hasn’t been an easy weekend for the team. We struggled a lot on Friday. Today we focused and gave it everything we’ve got and this is the best result we could get. Unfortunately, we lost some parts on Friday and we’re not using our new front wing, so that’s a few tenths that could have helped us get into Q3, which is what we’re looking for. In the end, it all comes down to focusing and driving as quickly as possible. This is what I did today and it’s what I’m going to do tomorrow to try to get the best result for the team.”

Guenther Steiner, Team Principal: “Not an unexpected qualifying result. We struggled yesterday. We had a lot of downtime with small issues on the cars, so we didn’t do a lot of running. In FP3 we got a little better understanding and then finished 14th and 17th in qualifying. It was a very good job from Esteban to get into Q2. Romain almost made it, but he got a bit hung up in traffic in the last sector of his lap, so he ended up 17th, just one place out of Q2. We will try to do our best tomorrow. Nevertheless, we’ve learned a lot over the weekend. We keep on learning every time. Last week we had both cars in Q3. This week we got stuck with one car in Q1. It’s so close in the midfield, and that’s the main reason why these things happen. Our car doesn’t seem to be very good in the slow-speed areas and you can see that on sector three of this circuit. But we’ll be up and going for tomorrow and aim to have a good race.”

Scuderia Ferrari

Vettel complained about transmission problems in FP3, but the fault didn’t hamper his running in qualifying. Both Ferraris comfortably made it through to Q3, but didn’t have the pace to match either Mercedes or Red Bull. They locked out the third row, with Raikkonen shading Vettel by 0.227s.

Kimi Raikkonen, 5th, 1:36.131: “Obviously we cannot be pleased with where we finished today, looking at the time difference to the front. We did what we could, but our position on the grid is far from ideal. This is the reality today and now we have to be stronger in the race. Yesterday we struggled a bit to find the right set up: we changed small things here and there and today the handling of the car was pretty good. We lack speed in the lap and to go faster we need more overall grip. Tomorrow is going to be a long race, the long run was not too bad, so I expect the car we had today to be better tomorrow. For sure we are going to do our best and hopefully we are going to have a strong race.”

Sebastian Vettel, 6th, 1:36.358: “Qualifying was not so good, hopefully the race will go better. Surely we can try and look at different things, learn from today, go forward, and for sure we are not pleased with the gap to the cars ahead. It was not the best session for me: overall it was ok, the car felt fine, but in the end we were not just quick enough. For sure in Q3 I could have done a slightly better lap, but at the end of the day obviously we are missing a bit compared to the cars in front, so I think tomorrow could be a different day. Probably in my last lap I was a bit too aggressive. There remains a bit of a question mark at this point, at least on why we were so competitive in fast corners in Suzuka and here we are missing out; but then again we are missing out across all sectors. For tomorrow we’ll see, there’s always a chance to outsmart the people but I think we have to react on the fly. The strategy is set for the beginning, in terms the tires to start the race with, but we kept some new tire sets, so we’ll see. It could be an interesting race: tyre degradation is always important, it could be playing a big role tomorrow.”




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