Racing Point F1 Team Technical Director Andy Green is conscious of the team’s progress but is confident that the team’s fortunes can turn around during the 2019 FIA Formula 1 World Championship.
The Austrian Grand Prix was another baptism of fire for the British team, as both Sergio Pérez and Lance Stroll were knocked out in Q1 on Saturday. The race saw little improvement with Pérez coming home in eleventh and his Canadian team-mate fourteenth with a fuel-flow meter problem.
That result means the squad have achieved two points in the last five races, courtesy of Stroll’s ninth place in Montréal. Pérez has gone five races without scoring since his sixth place finish in Baku. Racing Point lie seventh in the Constructors’ Championship, three points behind Alfa Romeo Racing. However, they are only two points ahead of Red Bull Toro Rosso Honda and a further a point clear of Haas F1 Team.
Green understands that there is work to be done to keep his team on track with their rivals.
“In the end we weren’t quick enough, as simple as that,” according to Motorsport.com. “We underperformed in qualifying, so we were in the wrong part of the grid, and once you’re there, it’s so difficult to do anything.
“We’ll pick ourselves up, and go to the next one. We know that there are improvements coming. You can see in the last few performances, we’re definitely making inroads.”
The team have aero upgrades to come before the summer break, as Green accepts that the upgrades will take time to develop before Racing Point can look to be a more regular top-ten contender.
“There are a few little aero bits at Silverstone, and we’ll keep them coming,” Green added.
“It’s a case of starting to look in a different direction. So there’s a small update at Silverstone, and the bigger ones are later, Germany/Hungary time. Silverstone is a small step towards that.”
Even with finishing ahead of Renault F1 Team, Toro Rosso and Haas, Team Principal Otmar Szafnauer believes that finishing as high as eleventh was not a good enough reward for the squad and qualifying will be one of the improvements that will help his team later in the year.
“It was very frustrating,” he told Motorsport.com. “Especially when we were just a couple of seconds off Raikkonen and Giovinazzi, and we matched their race pace.
“It’s just a matter of them getting us due to qualifying. We had good starts and were able to catch them, but when the race pace is the same, you can’t overtake.
“It is a positive that we can race with the Renaults now, although Alfa Romeo beat us, it was very, very close. So just a little bit of improvement on our part, and we’ll get it.”
