GP Spain - Pierre's Debrief

After the Portimao weekend, Formula 1 was in Barcelona. For the first time this season, Pierre failed to reach Q3. In a very tight Q2, Pierre finished twelfth but only 0.020 off Q3: "I'm obviously disappointed with the final result, it's the first time we've not made it to Q3 this year, and we missed out by just two hundredths, which is nothing. Having said that, I'm happy with the balance of the car this weekend, but we really struggled with grip; we seem to slip and then overheat the tyres, and on this track you really pay the price."

On Sunday, the race didn't start as expected; Pierre received a 5-second penalty for stopping a few centimetres too far forward of the start line. After taking his penalty during the first pit-stop, Pierre found himself at the back of the pack. He battled with Vettel and Alonso throughout the second stint, and then made the team's aggressive strategy work magnificently by stringing together spectacular lap times over the last 15 laps. 

After the second stop on lap 48, Pierre consecutively passed Vettel (lap 54), Russel (61), Raikonnen( 62), Alonso (62). On the penultimate lap of the race, Pierre overtook Stroll to claim 10th place, just 0.1 seconds behind Esteban Ocon.

"I have mixed feelings about today, I think in the race I made a good recovery but we really lacked pace compared to the first two laps, which is frustrating. I blame myself for making a mistake on the grid, it's a very stupid penalty to get and it's made my life more difficult. That said, I had some good battles in the race and managed to overtake a few cars to finish 10th. The car definitely has potential, but we haven't yet got it working consistently through all the corners on the circuit. We're going to work hard now ahead of Monaco and I have faith in the team to take some steps forward in the next few races."