Nico Hülkenberg felt there was more time in his VJM09 during Q3 in Singapore, which could have put him further up the grid than eighth place for Sunday’s race.
The Sahara Force India driver admitted the team achieved their target of making it through to the top ten shootout, but felt he could have been up to three-tenths of a second quicker, which would have put him sixth ahead of the Toro Rosso’s.
Hülkenberg remains confident that the team can show good pace during Sunday’s race at the Marina Bay Street Circuit, feeling they’ve done as much preparation work as they could do.
“I’m not entirely happy with eighth place,” admitted Hülkenberg. “I believe there was more speed in the car – maybe two of three tenths – but it was quite a messy session and we couldn’t extract the maximum from it.
“We always felt that Q3 was a realistic target, but we faced some strong competition, especially from the Toro Rossos. It was quite hard to find my rhythm because I had a software issue in Q1 and then the yellow flags in Q2 meant I didn’t complete my second lap.
“Considering all the circumstances, eighth place is a reasonable result and I think we are in good shape for the race. The long run performance from yesterday looked solid and we’ve done the homework we need ahead of the race.”
