Difficult and busy day for Sauber
The Sauber F1 Team had quite a busy first day of practice ahead of what will be the longest race in terms of duration this season. While Sergio Pérez is a rookie on the spectacular Marina Bay city circuit in Singapore, his team-mate, Kamui Kobayashi, has at least last year’s experience of this night race under his belt.
While Pérez had to familiarise himself with the circuit, Kobayashi and the team also used the sessions to complete some runs with a different engine mapping and new heat shields.
The first session was much shorter than scheduled – it lasted 48 instead of 90 minutes. First it was a 30-minute delay because of track repairs, and then two red flags cost another 12 minutes. The second session went according to schedule.
Sergio Pérez:
Sauber C30-Ferrari (Chassis 03 / Ferrari 056)
1st practice: 14th / 1:53.703 min (19 laps) / 2nd practice: 8th / 1:49,578 min (27 laps)
“Today we had very nice conditions for driving. The circuit is very demanding for the drivers and also for the tyres. You have to be focused all the time. Turn ten can be quite tricky because the kerbs are high, and if you get it wrong in that chicane you jump too high. I hope we manage to find a good balance for the car for the race. I think we have some good opportunities here to score points.”
Kamui Kobayashi:
Sauber C30-Ferrari (Chassis 04 / Ferrari 056)
1st practice: 15th / 1:53.749 min (12 laps) / 2nd practice: 9th / 1:49,730 min (29 laps)
“My car is quite okay. Generally it is better on circuits which require more downforce, which, unlike at the recent circuits we have raced on, is the case here. It is a different and a better feeling. Also for me both tyre compounds, the soft and the super soft, seem okay.”
Giampaolo Dall’Ara, Head of Track Engineering: “It is never very easy here and today it has been difficult but we have done a lot of work. For the first practice we had a bit of a disturbance because of a shorter session and two red flags, so, even though we tried to pull everything together, we couldn’t do what was planned and, because of this, the performance suffered a bit. For the second practice we completed our programme okay. We tested tyres, something on the set-up of the car and some checks that were planned.”
