Q. Q2! You must be thrilled? A. Yes, it’s an incredible feeling for me and the whole team. I feel very proud of us today; it’s a measure of how hard we have all been working and a nice reward for that effort. Q. Tell us about your qualifying, because it was a true reflection of pace and skill today, and less about luck. A. My lap in Q1 was really good first of all. It was a nearly perfect qualifying. The strategy was excellent; we were always one of the first cars out on track and everything just came together in Q1, despite the fact that there was a red flag and yellow flag interrupting our flow. Then in Q2 I set my lap on my first run on the supersoft tyre. We switched to the ultrasoft tyre but by then the rain was really coming and there was no way to improve. Easy to say I guess, but were it not for the rain, Q3 might even have been possible today. Q. What can you do from this grid position tomorrow? A. I have to be honest and say that tomorrow is a different story. We have struggled with tyre degradation in the races and we’re missing a bit of rear downforce at the moment, which is hard on the rear tyres. The forecast is for the weather to be a little bit unpredictable, so hopefully that might shake things up and help us. My plan is to drive every lap as fast as possible and see where we get to!

Q. Probably some mixed emotions for you but your pace was still impressive today. A. First of all, it was a great job by the whole team to get us into Q2. Yes, it’s a shame I didn’t get the chance to improve my lap time at the end of Q1, as there was certainly a lot more in the car. I didn’t get a clear track in my second run so I was banking on my third run after the red flag, but then the yellow came out and we had to abort the lap. Q. Some encouraging signs though. Do you think you can have a good race tomorrow? A. We’ve definitely been working towards the race so our qualifying pace was a nice surprise, but I think I will be more comfortable with the car in race trim. We’re gradually making good steps with improving the car and I think we can have a good race tomorrow.

The whole team can be extremely proud of our performance today. It’s a reflection of an enormous amount of hard work, both back at base and trackside. Pascal drove fantastically well and can feel very pleased with a perfect lap – in Q1 and Q2. His Q2 was all the more impressive for having been set on the supersoft tyre. Rio definitely missed out on a bit of luck today. He didn’t have a clear track for his second run and with the yellow flag he couldn’t improve on his third lap either, but there was certainly more to come from him and I’m sure he’ll be very motivated for tomorrow’s race. Tomorrow is another day though; the race brings its own specific challenges and it’s going to be very tough, but we’re up for it and we will do our very best.