2024 Dutch Grand Prix – Saturday

Stake F1 Team KICK Sauber struggled in windy conditions in qualifying for the Dutch Grand Prix, with Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu setting the 18th and 19th times of the session respectively. It was a tough day for the team, which means a strong comeback will be required in tomorrow’s race: Zandvoort, however, is known to produce surprising races, and the team will give its best effort to improve on its starting position when the Grand Prix starts here in the Netherlands.

Alessandro Alunni Bravi, Team Representative: “We experienced a day in which conditions changed significantly between FP3 and qualifying. FP3 was a session with little on-track action, as we spent most of the time in the garage following the red flag before making a few laps on Intermediate tyres under wet conditions. On that track, the car balance felt quite ok; however, once it had fully dried for qualifying, we weren’t able to find a good balance throughout the lap. Both Valtteri and Zhou struggled, especially in sectors two and three, and we weren’t able to extract the needed performance from our car. We need to analyse why we weren’t able to keep up with track evolution from FP3 and why we struggled so much with corner balance in sectors two and three. There is a lot of work to do and, unfortunately, we have to start in a similar position to where we were in the last two races. We must understand, all together as a team, how to find the optimal balance on track configurations that feature a mix of low- and medium-speed corners, as well as why we’re seeing inconsistent performance across different conditions. Tomorrow’s starting positions are definitely difficult, but we’ll do everything to try and grab any opportunity that may arise. It’s not the end of the weekend – but a difficult day, and we’re here together to overcome the situation for tomorrow.”

Valtteri Bottas (car number 77):
Stake F1 Team KICK Sauber C44 (Chassis 04/Ferrari)
FP3: 3rd / 1:21.155 (7 laps)
Q1: 18th / 1:12.168 (9 laps)

“When you look at the results from today’s qualifying, it’s clear that it’s not where we want to be – we want to keep making progress: this weekend, however, has proved tricky for us so far and today was no exception. This morning, the car had felt better in less breezy conditions, but as soon as the wind picked up, it amplified our weaknesses and inconsistencies, and we struggled with corner balance. Our car can be quite sensitive but, despite some traffic at the end of the lap, I feel we got out all we could from it. Tomorrow will not be easy, but this sport always throws you a chance, so we won’t give up and we will go in fighting. We know it will be hard to climb to the points, especially with overtaking being difficult, but this has to be our objective.”

Zhou Guanyu (car number 24):
Stake F1 Team KICK Sauber C44 (Chassis 03/Ferrari)
FP3: 11th / 1:23.240 (5 laps)

Q1: 19th / 1:13.261 (9 laps)
“Today was quite frustrating, with a tricky qualifying session. So far this weekend, the car has been feeling good and it felt like things were coming together for me. We noticed a lack of performance in high fuel runs yesterday, so we made some setup changes to address that; however, it looks like the direction we took resulted in a slower single-lap pace – something we definitely need to investigate. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to push the car as much as I wanted and started struggling with my tyres after turn three on each lap: we’ll need to keep analysing and addressing our issues to be better prepared for tomorrow. While this hasn’t been our track in the past as a team, we’ll keep working hard to get the most out of tomorrow’s race.”