05/11/2021
NEWS STORY
Alfa Romeo Racing ORLEN returned to action in Mexico as the team completed the first two practice sessions for the 2021 Mexican Grand Prix at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez. Kimi Raikkonen and Antonio Giovinazzi had a straightforward day, setting the tone for the weekend and ticking all the boxes needed ahead of tomorrow's qualifying session.
Kimi Raikkonen: "A fairly regular Friday. Like every time we are in Mexico, the grip is not there on Friday: the track is very slippery and you're not helped by the very little downforce you have, but it's the same for everyone and we expect things to improve slightly tomorrow. I think we're in a decent place with the set-up of the car, there's nothing too urgent to address but, as always, we'll need to squeeze some more speed out of the car overnight."
Antonio Giovinazzi: "Friday in Mexico is never the easiest day, we were struggling with the grip overall, but I think it was mostly because the track was so green, especially in FP1. Unfortunately, I got traffic in my push lap in the qualifying simulation, so my times are not reflective of our performance. The race pace was not too bad, so we can be optimistic for the rest of the weekend: we are there, we will keep working tonight in order to have a better day tomorrow. The target is to do the maximum we can do which means Q3. The track will evolve a lot in the next sessions and then we can have a better lap time and a better result than today."
Check out our Friday gallery from Mexico City, here.