Sauber, zero points but growing confidence
At Kick's house Sauber faces are more relaxed than two weeks ago. The points are the same – zero – but at least in Suzuka the pit stops went well. The problems this time came from the transmission Zhou (problem to be investigated after the Pirelli tests and in view of Shanghai, the first home GP in F1 for the Chinese), while Valtteri Bottas he got stuck in the train of slow cars behind Kevin Magnussen. For the Finn a 14th place which repeats the result of Melbourne.
Bottas' words
“Our overall pace looked pretty good today, and that's the positive we can definitely take from this race: it should have allowed us to finish higher than we did today – which confirms the step forward we've made in performance thanks to the updates we've made recently and the work we've done to refine our understanding of our package“, this is the comment of the former Mercedes. “Unfortunately, our points potential was dashed when we suffered traffic at the second stop: We stopped with a group of other cars, it wasn't an easy stop and, once back on track, I was stuck behind Magnussen for most of the final laps. I'm definitely disappointed, because today we could have achieved more and scored the first points of the season. However, our race pace looked promising and we made progress both on and off the track“.
“We can hope for a better performance in Shanghai: our priority remains to achieve a more consistent performance across the board and to fight for points in an extremely compact group. I'm excited to return to China after a few years, and it will obviously be an important event for us as a team and for Zhou: we hope to be able to fight again and score a good result and some points“.
Zhou's words
“It was a difficult weekend for me: unfortunately we encountered some small problems over the course of the weekend, from a reduction in travel time in FP3, which ultimately affected my qualifying, to a retirement in a race where I had the pace to recover some positions. I made a good start, then we realized that we could have some technical problems“Zhou added. “While this is certainly not the start to the year I was hoping for, we continue to work hard because we know things will get better: Our overall pace felt good and now I focus on preparing for my first home Grand Prix. With the team trackside and at the factory, we will analyze our issues and work to be in a better position to fight for points at home in China – both in Saturday's Sprint and Sunday's race“.
#Suzuka #Sauber #mistakes #top10 #Bottas
