Caterham F1 Team will be hoping for a much more successful Malaysian Grand Prix after neither of their drivers made it to the chequered flag in Australia.
Kamui Kobayashi never even made it through the first corner at Albert Park, with a brake issue causing him to go careening into the back of Felipe Massa‘s Williams. Then, 27 laps later, Marcus Ericsson‘s F1 debut ended with an oil pressure problem forcing him out of the race.
The team have put Australia behind them and now are fully focussed on improving at Sepang and bringing the best out of their new car.
“The way we bounced back in qualifying in Melbourne showed a little bit of what we can do, but without any real laps in FP1 or FP2 we only had a very small chance to fight,” said Kobayashi. “With a proper Friday and Saturday program we can give ourselves the opportunity to show the true pace of the car, and prepare much more for the race. Obviously, I’d like to also make sure I don’t have the same brake problems that caused the accident in turn one in Australia – without that I think we’d have had a strong race and we’ll work as hard as we can to give ourselves the chance to really perform.”
Meanwhile, Ericsson will be hoping that his previous experience at Sepang will put him in a stronger position going in to the weekend than he had before the opening round of the year.
“Sepang’s a track I’ve already raced on, so that’s obviously an advantage over Australia,” he explained. “I really like the heat and have trained hard all through the winter to prepare for races like Malaysia, so I’ll be 100% ready physically, but I’m still just loving being in F1 and for race two to be a home race for Caterham and on a track I know and like, that’s just really good for me. It’ll be great to see how much Caterham means to the Malaysian fans, and I’ve been told the autograph session on Sunday will be one of the real highlights of the year, so there’s a lot to be excited about!”
