Esteban Gutierrez put in his best qualifying performance of the season at the Red Bull Ring on Saturday, with the Haas F1 Team driver just missing out on his first Q3 with the team by just 0.006 seconds.
The Mexican driver will start a season’s high eleventh, and felt he got the maximum out of his VF-16 during the session, and was happy with his grid spot especially on the back of a tricky Friday at the circuit where he had limited running due to some issues.
Gutierrez is now eager to secure his first points of the season, having finished twice in eleventh place this season in both Spain and Monaco.
“I’m pretty happy as I made my best qualifying run of the season,” said Gutierrez. “It was fun to get the maximum out there on track.
“It wasn’t easy coming from Friday, where we had very limited running. Going into final practice, I was not completely comfortable with how the tires were working, so it was quite a challenge to head directly into qualifying.
“In the end, it was pretty fun putting in some good laps in Q1 and Q2. Tomorrow, I’ll be aiming for points. This is our target and I’ll be fighting all the way.”
