Belgian GP – post qualifying update

29.08.20

p19

1m44.138s

“For today’s sessions we made a few set-up changes to improve areas of the car I wasn’t comfortable with during Friday practice.

The changes worked well, and straight away in FP3 I felt the car reacting in the way I wanted it to. That was reflected in the lap time, so the potential was encouraging.

I left the car largely as it was for Q1 and my first banker lap was pretty good. Even with traffic on the out-lap, and on tyres that weren’t quite at their peak, it was decent.

However my second lap was more compromised. My tyres weren’t hot enough, which hurt my speed through Turns one, five and seven, and I had to lift at Turn 14 due to the yellow flag when Kevin Magnussen went off. A number of engine cuts also meant I was down on power compared to the previous effort.

Without those problems I reckon Q2, or at least being on the cusp, was possible – and that of course would have been a much more satisfying result.

I’m looking ahead to the race now, and there’s a lot of talk about the weather. The forecast is looking a bit iffy, and we could be in for some rain to spice things up.

If we get a wet race, that potentially creates an extra opportunity for us to capitalise on. That said, I’m also curious to see how we’d perform in the dry compared to our direct competitors. So, I’m happy either way. Whatever we get, I’ll be ready.”