Fri: Williams, Sauber, Lotus, Manor

Editor

It was a typical Friday for Williams, but Manor didn’t have the best of days as both Alexander Rossi and Will Stevens both hit the barriers.

Williams
Felipe Massa: “It’s always the job of Friday practice to understand the tyres and the track. It’s a difficult track here and today was not so different from what I expected, and very hot. Now we need to analyse everything to improve our performance for qualifying tomorrow. We know the teams around us are very competitive here, maybe even closer to Mercedes than usual.”

Valtteri Bottas: “The car felt good today, we were able to find a good balance. We tried the option tyre, which was a bit of a struggle for us today, so we need to analyse how we can get a bit more out of it tomorrow. The long run felt consistent tonight, so the main thing to work on from today is the option tyre.”

Sauber
Felipe Nasr: “I am satisfied with both sessions. It was important that we were able to gather a lot of data from our new aero package. At the moment it is difficult to judge the new aero package, but so far it has felt quite good. We need some time to analyse and understand all the data. Tomorrow we will also continue to work on the set-up of the car.”

Marcus Ericsson: “It was an interesting day. We tried many different things on the car, obviously this was with the new aero package, which gave us some valuable data. Overall, it looked positive, but we need to analyse the data in more detail in order to understand how much we benefit from it, and in which areas we need to adjust the set-up of the car to suit the aero update. It has been a decent day, but we have some work to do for tomorrow.”

Lotus
Romain Grosjean: “Marina Bay can be a tricky circuit to get on top of and today we struggled to get the pace out of the car. We have some work to do on set-up and it’s always difficult to get a clean lap here with the traffic. I didn’t get the cleanest of laps when we went on the softer tyres so we know that we can easily do better than sixteenth. We’ve got some work to do to refine the set-up ahead of tomorrow, but we’ve got a fairly good idea where to look. I’m sure we’ll be in a better position come qualifying.”

Pastor Maldonado: “The car felt pretty good in the first session and our pace wasn’t bad. For the second session the car didn’t feel great so we need to understand the changes we need to make for improvement. There was a small issue with a sensor in FP1 which meant my session ended slightly early but it was no big drama.”

Manor
Alexander Rossi: “It’s a shame that a small mistake overshadowed what for me was a very positive first day with the team here in Singapore. Prior to that, I was really pleased with how things were going, so I’m not too downhearted, although I have to acknowledge the supreme efforts of my car crew – both car crews in fact – in getting my car repaired so quickly. These are not ideal conditions to work in at the best of times, as the humidity is incredible, so I’ll try to reward their hard work over the rest of the weekend. I didn’t get the chance to do my option run, so it will be a busy FP3 session tomorrow, but I’m focused on the positives from today and looking forward to picking up where I left off.”

Will Stevens: “The day had been going quite smoothly until an unfortunate error on my part at the start of FP2. I was getting up to speed with the track and I’d completed some encouraging aerodynamic evaluations, and the second session would have provided the opportunity to put all of that together and see how we are looking for the rest of the weekend. It wasn’t to be, so we face a busy FP3 tomorrow to complete our programme ahead of qualifying. It’s a fun circuit and a really interesting experience, so I’m looking forward to getting back on track – literally – tomorrow.”