2023 United States Grand Prix – Saturday report
Alfa Romeo F1 Team Stake had its share of on-track battles during the United States Grand Prix Sprint, as Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu finished 16th and 17th respectively after a busy 19 laps of action.
With the eight points-paying positions out of reach, the Sprint was a good opportunity for the team to learn about the behaviour of its tyres in race conditions – knowledge that will turn useful in tomorrow’s race.
Alessandro Alunni Bravi, Team Representative: “Undoubtedly, our performance today hasn’t been on the same level as Friday, as we haven’t been able to match our direct competitors during the Sprint. Both our drivers found themselves unable to properly battle their way up the field. We will thoroughly analyse how today unfolded, to figure exactly what we were missing in terms of performance and in order to get back to where we were yesterday. There is a good amount of tyre data to assess overnight, to come back in competitive form for tomorrow’s main race. With better starting positions, we remain confident that we’ll be able to score points: with a good strategy, and by extracting everything from our package, we have a proper chance to do well.”
Valtteri Bottas (car number 77):
Alfa Romeo F1 Team Stake C43 (Chassis 02/Ferrari)
SQ1: 18th / 1:36.922 (6 laps)
Sprint: 16th
Fastest lap: 1:41.503 (Lap 18)
Tyres: Used Medium (20 laps)
“As a positive to take from today, we gathered a good amount of data about how the medium compound performed, information that will help us ahead of tomorrow. I think our main issue today has been the Shootout earlier this morning, where we haven’t been able to get a single clean lap; I already felt more competitive during the Sprint and managed to put up some battles with the cars around me, eventually gaining a couple of places. I felt better in the long run and felt our pace had improved as well. Tomorrow, we will be starting from more favourable positions: I am confident that, if we do our homework right, we will have an actual chance to gain places and get back into the top ten.”
Zhou Guanyu (car number 24):
Alfa Romeo F1 Team Stake C43 (Chassis 01/Ferrari)
SQ1: 1:36.554 (5 laps)
SQ2: 15th / 1:36.182 (6 laps)
Sprint: 17th
Fastest lap: 1:41.595 (Lap 18)
Tyres: Used Medium (20 laps)
“Although it was effectively a standalone day, today has been a tricky one; we generally lacked pace, and on top of that, I had an issue on the gear sync at the start, which immediately cost me some ground. Still, we had opted to use today’s race as a session to better learn and understand our performance ahead of tomorrow, and indeed we gathered useful data which we will analyse tonight. We seemed to struggle a bit compared to our main rivals in terms of race pace, and we’ll be looking into that as well in order to quickly bounce back. I am confident we can still fight for points tomorrow, we definitely had potential on Friday, and with better grid placements, we can hopefully build something useful in the race.”
