Early promise turns into disappointment for Sauber
Qualifying for the Sauber F1 Team was frustrating with the early promise from Q1 turning to disappointment in Q2. The updates the team has brought to the Circuit de Catalunya for the Sauber C30-Ferrari have definitely worked, with the pace for both drivers in free practice demonstrating this.
In the end Sergio Perez was 12th fastest in qualifying while Kamui Kobayashi was stuck behind a slower car and so could only manage 14th.
Sergio Pérez:
Sauber C30-Ferrari (Chassis 03 / Ferrari 056)
Qualifying: 12th/1:23,367 min (in Q2) / 3rd Practice: 12th/1:24,329 min (19 laps)
“I had no particular problems on my last lap, but it wasn’t good. Being 12th isn’t too bad and I’m very positive for the race, but my run with the new tyres today didn’t work out. This is a shame because I’m happy with the car and this is crucial for tomorrow’s race. Compared to this morning, we have made a lot of set up changes and they work.”
Kamui Kobayashi:
Sauber C30-Ferrari (Chassis 04 / Ferrari 056)
Qualifying: 14th/1:23,702 min (in Q2) / 3rd Practice: 7th/1:23,669 min (17 laps)
“On my last lap, when I was on new soft tyres, a Force India was in trouble in front of me, he made a mistake in turn ten and that was it for me. It is a shame because our new aero package is working well. We have clearly made progress and the car was definitely good enough for a place in the top ten. However, for the race we should be okay and dealing with the super hard tyres will be tricky for everyone.”
James Key, Technical Director: “It was a bit frustrating for all of us and not representative of where we want to be. Much like the last race, we need to come back a little bit tomorrow and try make something of it in the race. We made some good changes to the car overnight, and Kamui in particular was a lot happier with his car on newer tyres this morning. His pace looked pretty promising for qualifying so we didn’t really change the car much for him. For Sergio there was a little bit of work to do to improve his balance a bit, but that was worked on between FP3 and qualifying. Otherwise FP3 was generally quite good and we were happy the pace we appeared to have yesterday had carried over to this morning, so making a shot at Q3 possible. We did just a single run on soft tyres in Q1. Then we did a quick lap on used tyres in Q2 and a single lap on new tyres at the end of the session. Unfortunately Sergio was just a bit shy of the top ten, while Kamui ended up being stuck behind a slower car for half a lap, so he unfortunately lost his time and was unable to progress from P14, which was set on old tyres.“
