F1 | Bahrain Grand Prix, Ferrari – “We can improve further”

Sakhir – Being first on Friday does not bring points in the standings and the Scuderia Ferrari drivers, Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel, are well aware of the fact that the weekend in Bahrain has only just begun. Nonetheless, their comments after the first day of testing reflect the hard work put in by the whole team. Kimi had to pull over and stop the car at the end of the session due to a problem with the right front wheel, after the pit wall promptly informed him that something was wrong.

“It was a pretty quiet day and the car ran well,” said Kimi. “Like every Friday we tried different things and learned as much as we could. The feeling was the same everywhere, but in some areas of the track we could do better. The times were good, but they don't say much. It's only the first day and you can't know what the others have done. At the end of the second session, immediately after the pit stop, I felt some vibrations and the team told me to slow down and stop the car. We then discovered that the front tire was not properly secured, so we had to stop. Without a doubt we still have to improve. This evening we will put all the data together to try to make further progress."

“It's difficult to say where we are based on just one day of testing” Seb commented “but we've made some progress. In the long runs we can do better, so we'll see how it goes tomorrow. We made some mistakes here and there, but we tried to find the right pace for qualifying. This is the moment in which we need to try to find the limit of the car, especially this evening given that the conditions are the same as those we will have tomorrow and Sunday evening. I draw no conclusions regarding the result obtained today. We focus on ourselves and try to have a better feeling with the car, since there is still work to do, but I think we can still improve."