I’m looking forward to being back in the heat in Bahrain! I know we’ve been to some awesome tracks across Europe recently and whilst they’ve all been fun for various reasons, the weather has been too cold for me! I much prefer the heat and it’s still pretty warm in Bahrain during the evening, which is great. Two of the three practice sessions are during the day when it’s really hot and both qualifying and the race are in the evening when the circuit is a lot cooler. This does make preparing for this race a challenge and adapting to different set-ups is important.

It’s certainly a challenge for the cars and drivers racing in the heat. It’s going to be a little more conventional to have the tyres working back to normal and then it’s up to us to do the best on car set-up. Bahrain brings some great opportunities for overtaking and it’s also usually a great race for strategy, so let’s see what happens this weekend. Turn 1 is the best overtaking spot and Turn 4 is also pretty good. Overall, it’s a cool track, so I’m really looking forward to going there.

After several races at unfamiliar circuits in cold European autumn conditions, going to Bahrain is a change to more familiar territory. The drivers and teams know the circuit well and have a good idea of what to expect. One of the features of the Bahrain race weekend is the timing of the sessions, with practice one and three taking place in the heat of the day and practice two, qualifying and the race all later in the afternoon, when the track starts to cool down after sunset. This has a significant effect on tyre grip and performance, and makes practice two by far the most relevant practice session as it is the closest to the conditions of qualifying and the race.