George Russell was pleased after feeling it was a productive Friday at the Hungaroring, with the Briton able to work through his intensive track programme to further corelate the new updated FW42 despite the tricky weather conditions.
The Williams F1 Team driver ended seventeenth in the morning session in Hungary and repeated the feat again in the afternoon, with the reigning FIA Formula 2 champion feeling they learned a lot about their car across the day in both dry and wet conditions.
“It was a pretty productive day and I feel quite pleased with today’s running,” said Russell. “We learned a lot even with the limited laps we did, especially in the rain, but also in the dry.
“We did a full forty minutes of aero running in FP1 to correlate everything and make sure everything is working as expected. We didn’t do many laps in FP2, but it was still a very intriguing session for us.
“Generally, the pace was relatively strong, and I think we’ve learned some good things so hopefully we can follow that through into tomorrow.”
Team-mate Robert Kubica ended nineteenth fastest in both sessions but felt his day was trickier to that of Russell. The Polish driver has a huge number of fans in Hungary, and he hopes to give them something to cheer about later this weekend.
“It was a tricky Friday,” revealed Kubica. “During FP1, track conditions were ok with light rain and we were able to complete our programme. We were unlucky with the weather in FP2, but that’s just how it is, and it’s the same for everyone.
“It is kind of a home race although we are not in Poland so there are many Polish fans. I hope for dry weather this weekend so that the fans can appreciated the full potential of a Formula 1 car. I wish for a good weekend, for them, and for us.”
Senior Race Engineer, Dave Robson, said the conditions made for a challenging day for Williams, and with rain a possibility on Saturday during the Qualifying session, the running both drivers managed on Friday could be beneficial for them should the forecasted weather arrive.
“The conditions again have made for a challenging day, with rain influencing both sessions,” said Robson. “This morning there was light drizzle although the track stayed largely dry, which enabled us to complete most of our original plan.
“This afternoon was more challenging, but we were able to get a few laps in on the dry tyres either side of the red flag. Once the rain was hard enough for some good consistent running on the intermediate tyres, we took the opportunity to use both cars to do some testing on this tyre.
“Both drivers got a good feel for driving intermediate tyres in the wet conditions and the slicks in damp conditions and so looking at the forecast for tomorrow, we are perhaps well prepared for FP3 and qualifying.”
