Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN produced a strong performance over the Såo Paulo Grand Prix weekend courtesy of Valtteri Bottas‘ ninth place. Zhou Guanyu also ran inside the points for the majority of the afternoon at Interlagos, but the late deployment of the safety car hindered Zhou’s performance and prevented him from climbing up the grid for a better finish.
Bottas secured two points for the team, which extended the fight for sixth in the Constructors’ Championship by five points ahead of next week’s finale.
Running a soft/medium/soft strategy Bottas showed impressive pace in the C42 and managed a fastest lap of 1:15.511s during the sixty-second lap of the race. The Finnish driver had a remarkable race result, closing the weekend in ninth position after starting the race from fourteenth on the grid. After a challenging few weeks and a triple header of having to retire the car during the European stint of the season, Bottas was happy with his performance in São Paulo.
“I’m happy about today’s race and we’re happy as a team. Everyone did a really good job – to go from 14th on the grid to ninth at the flag definitely classes as a good result. We could have been even higher, but the Safety Car at the end didn’t really play in our favour: it cancelled the advantage we had on the cars behind us, and it left us exposed.”
Despite the unfortunate time of the safety car, Bottas was happy that the Alfa Romeo team outscored its direct rivals and gained some advantage over Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant Formula One Team ahead of the season finale.
“Still, we scored more than our direct rivals so we can’t complain too much. I did enjoy myself today, I was in some good fights and the car’s pace was strong. I also want to give big thanks to Zhou for being a true team player today. We have been in good form in the last few events, we have one more to go to get the job done but we approach it with confidence.”
Zhou Guanyu: “The Safety Car made it quite difficult for us to keep up”
Team-mate Zhou Guanyu was also pleased with the team’s performance in Brazil, despite running in the points for over fifty laps of the race, the driver managed to close the race in the twelfth position missing out on points by just two places.
After qualifying in thirteenth during Saturday’s sprint race, Zhou was able to make up one place on the grid for his end race result, although the Shangai-born driver ran in tenth for the majority of the race. But overall, Zhou seemed in good spirits and was happy to leave Brazil after maximising the team’s potential.
“Overall, we can be quite happy about the weekend, especially when you look at how we started, compared to where we finished. Our focus was to maximise the team’s potential, and I’m confident we’ve managed that.
“Still, today has been a bit difficult on my part: I got my drink system straw stuck in my helmet at the beginning of the race, before managing to remove it, but, later on, we suffered from some turbo issues, something we will have to investigate ahead of next week.”
After the unexpected problem of turbo issues, the team attempted to pit early to undercut the other teams running the midsection of the grid, most notably Aston martin who, until this week, were closing in on Alfa Romeo and the sixth spot in the Constructors’ Championship. However, the safety car, caused by McLaren F1 Team driver Lando Norris retiring from the race, made it difficult for the team to stay alongside the others and maintain pace.
“We pitted early, aiming to undercut other drivers, but then towards the end, the Safety Car made it quite difficult for us to keep up, especially because we didn’t have many tyres left.”
Like his team-mate, Zhou is certain the team will be approaching the final race of the season with confidence, after the Brazilian Grand Prix saw the team extend their lead from Aston Martin in the Constructors’ Championship.
“Nevertheless, it’s good to see that the team managed to bring home some more points to give us a good position for the constructors’ championship ahead of the final race.”
