Carlos Sainz Jr. was ‘very happy’ about Qualifying inside the top ten for the Monaco Grand Prix on Saturday, particularly after starting the weekend at the principality on the back foot after missing out on running during first practice on Thursday.
The McLaren F1 Team racer will start ninth on the grid at the Circuit de Monaco on Sunday, and the Spaniard admitted it was a great turnaround for the team to make it into the top ten shootout after missing first practice and struggling with the set-up of the car all the way through final practice on Saturday morning.
Sainz says Qualifying in Monaco is always an enjoyable experience for him but he knows the job is far from done, and now the aim is to convert this position into a top ten result on Sunday and his third points finish of the season.
“Very happy with this quali and back to Q3!” said Sainz. “After missing the whole of FP1 and a very difficult FP3 where we didn’t get it right on the set-up, finishing P9 today is a great turnaround of the weekend.
“I managed to put together very good laps, improving consistently to finish with that 1m11.4s which I think was the maximum we could extract today.
“I always enjoy qualifying around these streets, but the job is not done quite yet. Thank you to the team for a good analysis and a perfectly well-executed quali in the garage.”
