Ocon disappointed by his qualifying session

On a very tricky circuit, which he was discovering for the first time, Esteban Ocon did not perform a miracle and will start from the last position on the starting grid tonight.

The Frenchman experienced one of the most complicated qualifying sessions on Austin’s demanding track: « We struggled a bit with the Super Soft tires. I left the garage quite late because we had an issue with a wheel nut, so I had to push during my out lap, which didn’t help. Overall, it was a tough qualifying session. I made a small mistake that cost me a bit of time; it’s a difficult circuit. »

His race will, therefore, be complicated tomorrow, even though several strategies are available to him to gain a few positions: « For tomorrow, there will be many different strategies among the teams, some faster than others. But it should be interesting. We know our strategy for tomorrow, and we’ll see how it works. I need to have a good start, and we hope to gain a few places right away. One way or another, I’m expecting a good fight. »

On his side, Pascal Wehrlein is rather relieved to be ahead of his teammate after a very complicated start to the weekend. Indeed, he had to give up his seat to Jordan King during FP1, and an off-track excursion in FP3 deprived him of significant track time: « I made life a bit difficult for myself this morning by going into the gravel. It was a real bonus to be able to get back on track for the last 6 minutes of the session. My guys really did an excellent job. »

A satisfaction for the German to have achieved a rather good lap in qualifying. I gave everything I had. It’s once again a track that I’m discovering, and it’s a track where you need to get used to the corners and find the right rhythm before qualifying. I felt very unhappy after FP3 when I got stuck in the gravel, I couldn’t believe it. It took me some time to recover, to be honest. So there was a lot of pressure, and that’s why I’m really happy with my lap, concludes Wehrlein.