Jean-Eric Vergne, 18th (FP1): “I have enjoyed the brief time spent driving Friday mornings for Scuderia Toro Rosso. The main purpose has been to give me as much F1 mileage as possible, while also working on the team’s normal free practice programme. The start of today’s session was quite tricky, on a track I didn’t know with a surface that was a bit dirty at first. The track itself is great fun to drive. I did my first run on the Medium tyres, then for the next two I used the experimental Hards that Pirelli brought here for us to try out. Myself and Jaime also worked on an aero programme. I ran with low downforce and I found it difficult as I clearly lacked grip, but that does not matter, because it produced useful data for the team, which I hope will help them get a good result this weekend. I also want to thank them and Red Bull for giving me this opportunity.”
Sebastien Buemi, 15th (FP2): “I had to get everything done in the 90 minutes of the afternoon session and the team did a good job, giving me a car that was reliable and ran trouble free. This meant I was able to do a lot of laps, trying the prototype tyres, then the Medium and the Soft, completing a useful long run, so I am happy with my day. It is too early to talk about performance but generally, we are in the same group that we have been in for the past few races. As it is a very short track here, it is very important to get everything right, because a difference of one tenth of a second can have a big effect on your position on the grid.”
Jaime Alguersuari, 16th: “We experimented with different levels of downforce over the two sessions and I think I felt happier with the car’s behaviour in the morning, although we will have to assess the data before making a decision about this element of the package. The group we are in looks very close in terms of performance at this track. I think we can aim to be a bit higher up the order tomorrow, although it will be tough. In terms of set-up I think we have more or less got it how we want and with the tyres, the difference between the Medium and Soft is one of the smallest we have seen this season as the lap is very short in Interlagos. As for the race, we can expect a change in the weather, so maybe we need to gamble on running a wet set-up right from qualifying tomorrow.”
Laurent Mekies (Chief Engineer): “We had a busy day, completing our programme with our two cars and three drivers, all of whom were able to try different set-ups and run with the three compounds Pirelli has brought here; the experimental Hard for next year and the Medium and Soft which are the choices for the rest of the weekend. We were trying to find the right compromise in set-up terms because you have a very slow infield and a very long uphill straight. However, this weekend it seems there will be another factor in the equation, as after a nice dry and sunny day with high track temperatures, it looks as though we are heading for a wet weekend. It will be interesting to see how it evolves and I feel we have scanned enough elements today to have a good idea what to do whatever the conditions. Now we need to put everything together and make no mistakes in tomorrow’s qualifying.”
Discussion about this post