Marcus Ericsson saw his qualifying session ended at the end of Q1, and will start the Australian Grand Prix down in sixteenth position, one place ahead of Sauber F1 Team team-mate Felipe Nasr.
Swedish driver Ericsson felt he had a good session around the Albert Park circuit, and says he has a well-balanced car beneath him despite the limited amount of dry weather running everyone has had because of the Friday rain in Australia.
“It was a decent qualifying,” said Ericsson. “The driving felt good having a well-balanced car. The team did a good job despite the limited running yesterday.
“We expected that it would be very tight in Q1. We were close to Q2, but it was not close enough. Tomorrow we do our best to fight for points.”
Team-mate Nasr, who finished an excellent fifth on his Formula 1 debut a year ago at the track, felt his qualifying session was tricky, and found himself eliminated before the end of the opening session due to the new-look style qualifying format.
“It was a tricky qualifying for us,” said Nasr. “The whole grid is competitive, and we know we still have a lot of work to do from our side.
“For the race I am confident we can move up some positions. It is a pity that I went out with a new set of Supersoft tyres and could not have another flying lap as I ran out of time, but this is part of the new qualifying regime.”
