Saturday 23 August 2014

Mixed day for the Sauber F1 Team at Spa Francorchamps

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(Sauber F1 Team)

The Sauber F1 Team had mixed fortunes in today's qualifying session for Sunday's Belgian Grand Prix at the Spa Francorchamps circuit as Adrian Sutil did a great job for the Swiss based outfit as Adrian Sutil will start the race from 14th place on the grid giving the team one of their best opportunities to score their first world champion points of the 2014 season. Speaking following the session the German said:

'Again a wet qualifying in Spa, the same as last year. It was difficult to assess the situation on track, especially trying to work out how much water was still in the corners. Particularly during the rainy sessions, the car is still difficult to drive. Based on the weather forecast for tomorrow’s race, we chose a dry car set-up for qualifying which resulted in the balance of the car not being optimal. Under these circumstances we can be happy and it was important to finish qualifying without making mistakes. The team did a good job, and I got the best out of the car. I am satisfied with the outcome of qualifying.'

Last season Nico Hulkenberg and Esteban Gutierrez finished the race in 13th and 14th place respectively after starting the race from from 11th and 21st place so this season they will be aiming for a more positive result. 

While Adrian Sutil qualified in 14th place it was a disappointing session for his team mate Esteban Gutierrez as the Mexican will start the race from 20th place on the grid following a difficult session and will be hoping to make his way through the field come tomorrow's race. Speaking following qualifying Gutierrez commented:

'It has been an unfortunate weekend so far. It is very disappointing considering all the technical issues. The team is pushing hard to put everything together. Also from my side, I am trying to extract the most out of the car. However, under the current circumstances we are very limited on track time. With the mixed conditions it makes it even more challenging, and it is very difficult to get the most out of what we have. It is an unacceptable situation, and we need to change something to sort out all the technical issues. We have to make sure it does not happen again in the next sessions.'

Following the session, Sauber F1 Team Monisha Keltenborn said that she was happy with how Adrian Sutil had performed but was a little disappointed by Esteban Gutierrez but also confirmed that they are where they expected to be with regards Sutil's performance. She commented:

'Adrian put in a solid performance and got what we could expect here. We will see tomorrow what this means for the race. Regarding Esteban, it is disappointing that his weekend has so far been dominated by problems with the powertrain. This makes it very difficult for him and his crew to find the optimal set-up for the car, because track time is so limited. No doubt he is in a difficult position for the race.'

The team's head of Track Engineering Giampaolo Dall'Ara commented by saying:

'It was a challenging session with difficult weather conditions. However, on the procedural side of things everything went smoothly and the team did a good job. Unfortunately once again we lost a car due to a technical issue with the powertrain. Esteban had to stop out on the track due to a problem with the battery pack. This is frustrating because we are losing valuable time in preparation for the race. Adrian did solid job and is more or less where we can realistically expect to be. Now we have to make the best out of this for the race.'

© Ben Johnston 2014

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