"If Zhou was in front, that point was for us" - Alfa Romeo faced tire trouble while pushing their rookie driver into the points at F1 Australian GP
Alfa Romeo F1's head of trackside engineering, Xevi Pujolar, believes Guanyu Zhou delivered a strong performance despite losing out on a points finish at the Australian GP.
The Spanish engineer believes the Chinese driver could have scored a P10 at the Australian race weekend if he had the pace.
Speaking to Racing News 365 in Melbourne, Pujolar said:
“We were trying to push and give him the gap, but he was struggling at that point with pace. We lost some time in the last few laps with traffic with Lance Stroll, but it was very close. I think if Zhou was in front, that point was for us.”
🗒️ “We solved the problem at the start and the race was good: I am looking back at my first three rounds in F1 and my worst result is 11th, so I can build on this positive start, aiming to score in every race.”
@ZhouGuanyu24 was close to the points today: sauber-group.com/motorsport/f1-… https://t.co/lQ5As9qybf
With virtual safety cars and traffic, the Alfa Romeo driver lost performance towards the end of the race as he got stuck in traffic.
Alfa Romeo are impressed with Guanyu Zhou’s strong performance
Pujolar believes Zhou had a strong weekend despite not scoring any points. Performance-wise, he believes there were no problems or on-track incidents for the Chinese driver, and he managed to live up to the expectations Alfa Romeo had from him.
Impressed with Zhou’s performance in Australia, Pujolar said:
“I would say very good, another strong and solid weekend. You can see that many people had problems, incidents, crashing. For us, it was very important to start the weekend [well], build up session by session, and don't push too much, because as soon as you make a mistake, it will take a long time to recover.”
“The team did a good job in difficult circumstances today: the timing of the first Safety Car wasn’t ideal and it cost us track position, but we earned our place the difficult way.”
📣 “The team did a good job in difficult circumstances today: the timing of the first Safety Car wasn’t ideal and it cost us track position, but we earned our place the difficult way.”
Team Principal, Frédéric Vasseur, gives his insight on the #AusGP: sauber-group.com/motorsport/f1-… https://t.co/IyRE0sMwK7
While there is a significant gap between Zhou and his experienced teammate Valtteri Bottas, they have managed to work together to push the team ahead.
Bottas has made a significant amount of contributions by bringing his experience and energy to the team. As a result, he has stepped into the role of team leader and mentor for Zhou.
Zhou scored his maiden point at the Bahrain GP and is currently 15th in the driver’s standings.