Max Verstappen believes the long run pace of his Aston Martin Red Bull Racing car is positive after bouncing back from an issue in first practice for the Bahrain Grand Prix on Friday.
The Dutchman failed to set a time in first practice after an electrical issue but is not worried about what transpired, feeling he managed to catch up in the evening session.
“We had a small issue this morning,” said Verstappen. “These things happen so it doesn’t concern me looking ahead to the rest of the weekend.
“It was not ideal to miss so much track time, it meant that I spent the beginning of the second session searching for the balance of the car which took a while.”
Despite missing first practice, Verstappen was able to find some balance with his Red Bull car.
“For such a short time in the car I managed to find quite a good balance and the long run pace looked pretty positive,” said the Dutchman. “I was also happy with how the tyre degradation looked at the end of that session.”
Verstappen believes strategy will play a big role in the race on Sunday and thinks that they only need to sort out their short run pace in third practice.
“Come race day it will depend a lot on strategy, you can follow at this track better than others so with the right planning and a bit of luck you can get a good result,” said Verstappen. “I think Practice 2 is the most important as it’s the closest conditions to the race, the others are a bit warm.
“Tomorrow we need to fine tune the short run pace in order to put ourselves in contention on Sunday, I’ll try to improve the feeling and balance to put myself in the best position possible.”
