Fri: Williams, Haas, Sauber, Manor

In an unfamiliar position, Williams were relatively slow today and will be hoping for a much better FP3 and qualy ahead of the Malaysian Grand Prix on Sunday.

Williams:
Valtteri Bottas: “Today was a pretty standard Friday. We got plenty of data and it was interesting to understand how the new tarmac would affect this year’s car. It definitely provided more grip. The tyres were also behaving more consistently than in previous years. The long runs were especially interesting today but the feeling was positive and we got some good data from them. We still need to improve our one lap pace, but the overall feeling is OK.”

Felipe Massa: “Unfortunately, we didn’t do what we were supposed to do today. I had to abort a few laps as we had an issue which lost us some time, so it wasn’t a straightforward afternoon. The pace also wasn’t fantastic compared to others, so we have work to do tonight to hopefully have a better Saturday.”

Haas:
Esteban Gutierrez: “It was a very productive day for us. The track is very interesting. It’s extremely smooth, which is changing the way the tires are working and the setup of the car. We’ve been experimenting a little today to learn everything we can about how the car is performing here. We’re progressing well and, hopefully, we’ll be able to extract the maximum from our setup, which is the most important thing we’re focusing on. Tonight we’ll be going through all the data to see which direction we need to take to perform the best we can during qualifying.”

Romain Grosjean: “It was a difficult practice this afternoon. We just couldn’t find a balance in the car. It’s frustrating. I wasn’t happy with the car, but we just need to put our heads down and come up with a solution before tomorrow. If there’s a positive, it’s that we got some laps in this Friday, but there’s a lot of work to do to improve the weekend.”

Sauber:“It has been a good first day here in Sepang. It was a typical Friday, preparing for the weekend with short and long runs on different tyre compounds. We also continued our aero measurements in order to get more information out of the aero package. Overall it was a troublefree day on which I was able to run a good amount of laps. Now I need to sit with my engineers to analyse the data in order to improve.”

Felipe Nasr: “It was a normal Friday. Due to the new asphalt, we could see that the track surface is much smoother compared to last year. We had to reassess all the tyre information to understand how the car reacts in order to work on its balance. When we did the long runs in the afternoon we had some cooling issues, because of the engine limitations for the practice sessions. It forced us to reduce our running, but these issues will be sorted out for tomorrow. Otherwise, we need to work on the car’s balance for the rest of weekend.”

Manor:
Pascal Wehrlein: “It was a more positive Friday than in Singapore, so I am happy. The track is great but the car is behaving differently than expected so we are looking into that at the moment. We need to analyse all the data tonight to see what we need to do to get on top of that. We’re struggling with the tyres here, but we’re still working on the set-up trying many different things for the car to get it best suited to this track.”

Esteban Ocon: “I’m pretty happy with all the work that has been done by the team between Singapore and here. We’re definitely progressing, which is very positive. We’ve made good steps between FP1 and FP2, so it’s promising for tomorrow. It’s a great circuit. Very challenging for the car and driver. The track temperature in particular is pretty interesting! But it’s all good; we made a good start and more to come, I hope.”