12/04/2019
NEWS STORY
Max Verstappen: "Today has been pretty good. We have a good balance in the car and not too many issues, so I'm pretty happy. Of course there was a question mark coming here after Bahrain but we were all quite confident that if we could solve the issue we would be a lot closer, which I think we have shown today. The long runs were alright but it is all about managing your tyres over a race distance here, but that's the same for everyone. Overall, I'm happy with the pace so far and tonight we just need to fine tune the set-up. I think pole position will be tough tomorrow and it's too early to say exactly where we are but we're a lot closer, so hopefully in the race we can mix it up."
Pierre Gasly: "I always want more, but I'm quite happy with the programme today. I think we have a good direction and Max showed that the car has good potential. We tested a lot of things between FP1 and FP2, we were pushing the development as much as we could, so now we need to analyse every part we used today. In FP2 I had quite a big moment in the third sector on the fastest lap and lost a bit of time, so it's actually not really representative for the potential of the car. I think we need to focus on tomorrow now and improve my set-up. Also the degradation of the tyres is always difficult here, as the track layout is really tough for the fronts, especially the front left tyre. It is important to find a compromise between qualifying and the race here, but the Team has the experience and the knowledge so I'm sure we'll find the right direction for tomorrow."
Check out our Friday gallery from Shanghai, here.