Starting tomorrow’s race from third is not too bad and the car is ok, even if it’s not exactly how we would like it and we are not as fast as we wanted to be. But we’ll start from there and see what we can bring home. This track is unique and conditions are different to what we experienced in testing. We have definitely improved the car overnight, but obviously not enough to be in front of everyone. In tomorrow’s race we’ll have time to understand the car further. We will race as hard as we can and see where that takes us. After all, we are just 16 metres behind pole position.

I can’t say I’m happy with this qualifying result. After a good Q1 and a very good Q2, in Q3, especially on my second run, I made a few too many mistakes, especially in the first sector and I was unable to improve. I will try to learn from this and to prepare as well as possible for the race. As for the gap to our main competitors, I have to admit that maybe we had expected it to be smaller, even if this is an unusual track which often throws up a different order to what we can see on a more traditional track. On our side, I think there is still room to work on the car and the race is tomorrow and will be pretty long, so I am still aiming for a podium. I will definitely have to get a perfect start, because overtaking is far from easy here.

We can’t say this was the result we were expecting, but we are well aware that Albert Park is not an ideal track for us, as its characteristics do not suit our car that well. Of course, we must improve, but we have gathered a great deal of information to identify the areas on which we must work. As usual, Seb showed that he knows how to use every centimetre of the track and Charles got through his first real test, a few little errors notwithstanding. Ahead of us, we have another 20 qualifying sessions and 21 races, so it’s a long game and we’re ready to play it.