Frédéric Vasseur, Team Principal of Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN is confident that the team can finish strongly tomorrow as they will give it their all to finish in the points.
Both Alfa Romeo drivers were knocked out of the second round of qualifying around the Suzuka International Racing Course. Valtteri Bottas will start Sunday’s race in twelfth and his team-mate Zhou Guanyu will start in fourteenth on the grid, with the Finnish driver missed out on Q3 by less than a tenth of a second.
Vasseur says this gives the Alfa Romeo team a great opportunity to score points tomorrow and with the weather forecast still in the balance for the race, there is everything to play for.
Vasseur believes that today’s qualifying shows just how close the midfield pack are but, he feels optimistic that with the new upgrades on the C42 this weekend and the possibility of wet conditions, that this could give the team a better chance of scoring points.
“Today was another demonstration of how close the midfield is, as we missed out on a place in the top ten by less than 0.1s with Valtteri. I am also pleased for Zhou – Suzuka is a very complex track, and he did really well as in his first experience on this circuit.”
“Even though we would have wanted to be in Q3, we can be optimistic about tomorrow’s race; we are close to the points with both cars, on a track where overtaking is possible and where we have pace.”
“The weather is the big question going into Sunday: we looked strong in the wet yesterday, so a rainy afternoon tomorrow could play to our strengths. In any case, we know we can be in the fight: we’ll give all to bring home some points.”
