Jean-Eric Vergne (STR8-03)

First Practice Session

Best lap: 1:41.924, pos. 15th, 19 laps

Second Practice Session

Best lap: 1:40.446, pos. 15th, 30 laps

“We had a problematic Friday, with the main difficulty having to do with the balance of the car. We are not too sure what is the cause of these problems, so it will be a long night to study the data to try and find a solution. Strangely, the car felt better in the morning session. We are not happy with where we are now, but I still believe the car can be much better here, so we just need to put everything together in the right way and try again tomorrow morning.”

 Daniel Ricciardo (STR8-01)

First Practice Session

Best lap: 1:42.043, pos. 17th, 18 laps

Second Practice Session

Best lap: 1:40.552, pos. 16th, 26 laps

“Unfortunately we were on the back foot right from the first session, because the pace wasn’t there. We really thought we could cure it for the second session, but that wasn’t actually the case. However, I still believe this is a track that should suit us, but we are leaving it to the last minute to be competitive tomorrow. It would have been nice to have a good Friday session, so now we just have to work hard to turn things around.”

Laurent Mekies (Head of Vehicle Performance): “An unusual two sessions for us, as we are unhappy with the balance of both cars and, as a result, our performance level was not what we were expecting on a track layout that should suit us quite well. There is no reason why tomorrow, we cannot be back where we should be on this type of track. Clearly we have hit some performance limitations on both cars and now we must try and give Jean-Eric and Daniel a well balanced car for tomorrow.”