‘We need to understand why’: Colapinto on tough China qualifying | OneFootball

The debut of Franco Colapinto on the Shanghai circuit was not as expected. After finishing 16th in qualifying for the sprint race of the Chinese Grand Prix, the Argentine Alpine driver did not hide his frustration and admitted: “I’m a bit lost because I ended up far behind Pierre, and he’s my reference point.” The result of his teammate, Pierre Gasly, who finished seventh, highlighted the difficulties faced by the young driver from Buenos Aires in what is, so far, his greatest weakness in Formula 1: the qualifying session.

Despite having had a decent start in practice, Colapinto admitted he couldn’t maintain the pace when the pressure increased. “I was close in FP1. It’s a track I didn’t know, I had a lot to improve and work on, but I didn’t make the step from FP to qualifying,” the driver explained. In light of this, he pointed out that the team has a long night of analysis ahead: “There’s a lot to work on tonight and improve for tomorrow’s qualifying,” although he noted that “it was good to get to know the track and understand everything a bit more.”

Finally, the Argentine was blunt when evaluating his performance on the Asian track ahead of Saturday’s sprint race. “I lacked quite a bit of performance today. We need to understand why and come back better tomorrow,” he concluded. With George Russell (Mercedes) starting from pole, Colapinto will look to take advantage of the midnight sprint race to regain ground and correct course ahead of the main qualifying session.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇪🇸 here.