Friday: Hamilton and McLaren on the Right Track
Energized since Abu Dhabi, Lewis Hamilton clocked the best times in both sessions and hopes to bring McLaren the pole for their last collaboration. Meanwhile, Jenson Button was more reserved, but on a different aerodynamic setup.
Lewis Hamilton – 1st and 1st:
« It was a positive day. I hope we can maintain our form or even progress tomorrow. We seem strong, but this track can be so tough on the tires that it’s hard to make any reliable predictions at the moment. The track and ambient temperatures were so high today that I almost felt like I was sliding throughout the lap with the tires melting! Having said that, our long runs are usually more challenging with the tires, but they seemed quite good today. It’s great to have such a positive Friday with the team: it was one of the best Fridays we’ve had in a very, very long time, actually. I’m savoring every moment of this weekend, and I’m going to take photos of my engineers and mechanics every day. The car feels really good – thanks, guys – and it would be a perfect Saturday if I could get pole tomorrow. »
Jenson Button – 4th and 8th:
« We were running with a configuration with a lower level of aerodynamic downforce than Lewis this afternoon. It was quite an interesting comparison, but with hot weather, lower downforce makes things more tricky because the car slides more, which damages the tires. Still, it was a useful test because we needed to see how the smaller rear wing works. Overall, it functions in a different way, so we wanted to be able to understand that. Using the smaller rear wing, our pace on long runs was good, surprisingly. However, our pace on a single lap was not as good, probably because we were not able to use the DRS as fully as we could have with the larger wing. »
