I hope it stays this close for the coming races. It’s exciting to watch and to drive like this. Development will
be key and we have to push hard."
Carlos Sainz #55
"I had a very good launch at the start but I ran out of space on the right and Max got better traction on the
inside line.
From then on, the race was quite straightforward, even though I would have expected to have been given
back the position ahead of Checo (Perez), as I came out of pit lane ahead of him, while the Safety Car was
still out. Having to wait for the restart to get back to third meant I could not try and fight for second place..
P3 is a good result and overall, this has been a fairly positive weekend, definitely better than one week ago
in Bahrain. I feel we are going in the right direction with this car and I’m sure it’s just a matter of time before
we are fighting a bit further up the order. We have a clearer picture of where and what we need to improve
and we have a direction to follow. I can’t wait to go to Australia after two years without racing there."
Mattia Binotto, Team Principal & Managing Director
"This evening, we were all treated to a great show with two strong drivers fighting for the win. In the end, it
didn’t go our way, but once again we were competitive. It’s been a great start to the season, with 78 points
scored over the two races, out of a possible total of 88. That’s definitely a significant figure and we can be
pleased about it.
Charles and Carlos both did well and were clear thinking, especially at the key moments, which helped in
bringing home as many points as possible. A few incidents affected the outcome, but having said that,
congratulations to Max and Red Bull who were very strong today. We move on from a positive weekend and
head for the next two rounds in Melbourne and Imola, where we will try to get the most out of our car."
Esteban Ocon, started P5, finished P6
"It's some good points scored again for us and I'm happy overall with my race. The fight with Fernando was
enjoyable. It was hard, fair, wheel to wheel racing, which reminded me of the karting days. With these cars,
you can really race and follow, which is good for the sport. It’s a shame we couldn't put both cars into the
points but we're showing that we're competitive and we must continue that. It was an exciting end to the
race as well just beating Lando [Norris] to the line. It felt a bit like redemption for last year!"
Fernando Alonso, started P7, finished DNF
“We don’t know what happened yet but we’ll investigate the issue tonight. We did lose a chunk of points
today, but it’s good to see the car performing well tonight and all weekend. I think we deserved sixth place
today and we were having a good race, so it’s bad luck we couldn’t get to the end. The battle with Esteban
on track was fair, we always respect one another out there. We had some close fights in Bahrain too and
always try to do the best for the team. I was a little bit faster during the race and so I made the overtake
and I had to watch out for Bottas as well. We could have scored double points tonight, but we are still fourth
in the championship and we go again in Australia.”
Otmar Szafnauer, Team Principal
“We have mixed feelings from today’s race and, in general, it’s another strong result, which underlines our
competitiveness. It’s a great result for Esteban to finish in sixth place. He’s been solid all weekend and it’s
good for him to convert a strong qualifying performance into a healthy bag of points. We do have a taste of
disappointment that we were unable to put both of our cars into the points with Fernando unfortunately
retiring from the race after driving very well all evening. We’re investigating the issue to see what exactly has
occurred. It’s clear our car has the potential to fight for big points as demonstrated by both of our drivers
tonight. We’re happy to let them race hard and fair as, in the end, having both drivers extracting the
absolute maximum from the car is what we’re here to do. Everyone at the team will continue to work hard
on our return to Enstone and Viry to best prepare ourselves for Formula 1’s highly anticipated return to
Melbourne in two weeks’ time. Well done to everyone at the team, we’ll keep pushing!”
Valtteri Bottas #77 DNF Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN C42 (Chassis 01)
“It’s a pity to retire from what had been a really good race until that moment, especially as we were looking
good for P6 at least. The engine temperatures kept rising, we need to investigate what caused that, but we
had to pull the car out as we didn’t want to lose the engine. It’s how racing goes, we now need to make
sure we solve whatever issue it was and move on. Looking at the positives, the car is really good. We made
another step forward from the previous race, even in the starts. We were doing a good job and enjoying
some close battles: now let’s make sure we get back to scoring in Australia.”
Zhou Guanyu #24 11th Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN C42 (Chassis 02)
“I want to think this was a good experience in terms of getting more confidence with street circuits in
Formula One. It was useful, but overall the race was definitely far from ideal: we had the anti-stall kicking in
at turn one, even though I had a much better start than in Bahrain, so we will need to understand what
happened. I had made a good recovery from P18 and we were looking strong to bring home some points
again, but the drive-through put us far at the back and that was it. Let’s hope for a smoother race in
Australia, the car feels good so we can be competitive again.”
Frédéric Vasseur, Team Principal
“It’s a disappointing end to an evening in which we showed so much pace. We were on course to have two
cars in the points again, but luck was not on our side tonight and we leave with nothing: Valtteri was
stopped by a cooling issue when he was fighting for P6, while Zhou, who was recovering from the bottom
after his car went into anti-stall after a contact with Ricciardo in turn two, would have been in the top ten if
not for the drive-through penalty he was given. It hurts, but this is racing, sometimes, and all we have to do
is pull ourselves up and make sure we keep delivering tonight’s speed at the next races.”
|
