I was happy when I crossed the line and could see I was fourth. But then I was only a hundredth off Valtteri so I was kind of happy but then I was like: a hundredth is nothing, but I felt with what I had that was all I could do. Q1 I was miles off the pace and even this morning in FP3 so it hasn’t been the easiest weekend up until now. The wind was a big struggle for everyone today. The track is really open and the wind blows from all directions so it’s quite strong. That factor combined with the track being a bit bumpy and slippery is why the lap times are not crazy fast this year. But then towards the end of Qualifying on the last lap we managed to find a little bit more so that was positive and I’m happy to end there. Second row is good enough to fight tomorrow.

Today did not go as planned. The car balance was good so it was definitely possible to go quicker but I made a mistake. I’m not happy with that so I would class this as a very disappointing qualifying. In the last sector I lost a lot of lap time which is really frustrating, I think if not I could have been up with Sebastian in P3 which makes it even more disappointing. I had a new engine which felt ok; I need to check the data but everything seemed to work well. I qualified on the Supersoft so we will have to wait and see what I can do on that tomorrow. We have the car and the performance is there so even though I am starting at the back of the grid I’ll try to overtake as many cars as possible and move through the field. To get back to sixth would be good and anything higher would be great. My long runs have felt strong all weekend so we will see how the degradation goes and start from there.

Overall, a satisfying Qualifying, particularly for Daniel, who extracted the maximum from the car in Q3 today to pip Kimi for fourth place and take a place on the second row. Max unfortunately made an error in the final sector which cost him but it is relatively immaterial knowing he will be starting towards the back of the grid for tomorrow’s grand prix. COTA offers opportunity for overtaking, and our drivers are not shy of that, so we will be hopeful both drivers can make an impression on the race tomorrow.