Carlos Sainz Jnr is frustrated he will not drive in the first practice session for the second weekend in a row in Malaysia.
Sainz will miss first practice as Sean Gelael will drive his car, as was the case in Singapore. Rookie Pierre Gasly has taken Daniil Kvyat’s place in the team’s other car this weekend.
“Let’s say I’m not the happiest man now knowing that I will miss for the second consecutive time free practice one,” said Sainz.
“Obviously in Singapore it turned out to be good because we still managed to get to Q3 and be fourth. But in a tougher weekend like Malaysia that I expect I will have some work to do in FP2 and FP3, hopefully like in Singapore we can do our best and come back strong like we did there.”
However Sainz admitted he was very pleased with his career-best result in Singapore after missing the first practice session.
“It was a great weekend all around,” he said. “First of all the news on Friday, then Q3 on Saturday, fourth place on Sunday. Probably one of my best weekends in Formula One.”
Sainz shrugged off a suggestion that the news of his impending move to Renault inspired him to produce his best drive yet. “It didn’t really affect me,” he said. “to be honest I did everything that I’ve done this year, it just happened to be my best result in Formula One which is quite nice to do it in the exact same weekend.”
“I’m very proud of it. We did celebrate a bit on Sunday but at the same time from Monday onwards I was watching videos of previous years in Malaysia and I turned the page pretty quickly.”
kartguy07
28th September 2017, 9:52
Given that he’s moving to Renault and how Red Bull move driver’s around, he’s probably lucky if he doesn’t get bumped for more than just first practice. I guess it will mainly depend on the constructor’s championship points situation – it’s quite right at the moment.
kartguy07
28th September 2017, 9:53
Quite tight at the moment.
petebaldwin (@)
28th September 2017, 10:00
You don’t have to look far to realise that it could be a lot worse, Carlos!
BasCB (@bascb)
28th September 2017, 21:04
indeed!
hahostolze (@hahostolze)
28th September 2017, 10:11
I understand his sentiment. Not being in the car in any case in bad: having to hand it over to an absolutely awful driver is worse.
Hugh (@hugh11)
28th September 2017, 10:35
Yep, this is my thought. Gelael has 17 points in F2, only 3 drivers are below him who have done every round. And he’s managed to pay his way to an F1 practise. Stupid
F Truth (@)
28th September 2017, 10:41
His only career wins came in obscure entry level Asia series. He managed I think 2 podiums in British F3 across 2 seasons, he is truly ‘sub optimal’.
Nick Wyatt (@nickwyatt)
28th September 2017, 11:07
How did he get his Superlicence?
F Truth (@)
28th September 2017, 11:38
Through mileage alone i’d imagine.
diditsatriady
28th September 2017, 11:47
Wait does he got super licence yet? Don’t think he have one at the moment
hahostolze (@hahostolze)
28th September 2017, 13:34
Don’t need one for FP
Nick Wyatt (@nickwyatt)
28th September 2017, 14:24
@hahostolze Thanks, I thought all the drivers did.
nase
28th September 2017, 15:52
@hahostolze
Akshually …
… you do need a super licence to be allowed to drive in Free Practice. There’s a dedicated FP Super Licence with similar, but more relaxed, criteria. Crucially, there’s a paragraph that enables the competent National Association to grant such a licence on the basis of subjective criteria.
anon
28th September 2017, 17:28
@hahostolze, following on from his performance in the mid-season test at the Hungaroring, GT-Racer mentioned that, having spoken to Toro Rosso’s engineers in private, they told him that the technical feedback that they got from Gelael turned out to be surprisingly good.
He might not be a great race driver, but if that information is correct, then it would suggest that Gelael might be a surprisingly decent development driver (GT-Racer, if you are reading this, I would be interested to know where they thought that Gelael stood in relation to Kvyat and Sainz).
Simon (@weeniebeenie)
28th September 2017, 22:45
So he’s the next Luca Badoer then.
F Truth (@)
28th September 2017, 10:27
The KFC Kid strikes again. 😴
Steve
28th September 2017, 11:22
Has a team ever entered a practice session with 2 less experienced/practiced drivers?
petebaldwin (@)
28th September 2017, 11:50
True but has a team ever existed where the owners care less about it’s results in races?
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
28th September 2017, 12:07
HRT in the 2010 Bahrain Grand Prix springs to mind:
https://www.racefans.net/2010/03/12/sutil-heads-bahrain-free-practice-one/
Poor Chandhok still didn’t have much experience by the time the race started. But that didn’t matter as neither of them qualified!
JackySteeg (@jackysteeg)
28th September 2017, 20:36
They did qualify didn’t they? I think the 107% rule wasn’t reintroduced until 2011, presumably as a response to HRT starting that race so badly underprepared.
Fresillo
28th September 2017, 13:22
I would love to know how much they paid for Sean’s 4 FP1 this year.
RL
28th September 2017, 15:09
Around a million I would say…