Albon slower than Verstappen: 'I can see that without data'

For Alexander Albon the qualifying for the Sakhir Grand Prix did not go quite as expected. The Thai already dropped out in the second part of qualifying and has to start the race from 12th position. Although the driver of Red Bull Racing now has free choice of tyres, it will be difficult to make up places.

“First laps are quite hectic and I think especially in the F2 race it seemed like it was quite lively out there. This kind of new circuit tends to lend itself to being side by side for a few corners with a left, right, left, right start, which is nice,” Albon explains in Red Bull's online press conference. With this, the Thai points to the fast cornering combination in the second sector.

Losses compared to Verstappen

“Friday was actually good race pace wise. We are definitely a bit higher downforce than the cars around us so it depends because obviously higher downforce tends to be harder to race with because you're a bit further down on the straights to the other guys, but at the same time hopefully we can make it up in the corners and slide a bit less. Then we can progress our way up the field,” hopes Albon.

The young driver has to deal with a big difference compared to his teammate Max Verstappen, but he doesn't care about that. “It's very clear where the deficit to Max is, I could tell you where I was slow without looking at the data, it's just a bit of a lack of FP3 running I think on the soft tyre because it was so different. The medium and the hard is quite similar feeling but the soft is quite different. It's a tricky one and it's a lesson learned and an experience on my side. It just meant that when it came to qualifying it was tricky to get the low speed,” adds Albon.