Alex Albon
“In Silverstone, we were definitely more competitive than at the previous two races and we were able to find a much better balance with the car. We managed to get into Q3 again and the car generally felt good. However, that doesn’t mean I expect an easy weekend in Germany, which will be another tough event for us. We have made progress and we know which parameters we need to work on and it’s going in the right direction.
As for my memories of Hockenheim, I remember qualifying on pole there in GP3 and then I crashed out of the first race while I was leading. Then I also crashed in Race 2! It’s an okay track, it’s what I would call a “standard” track, with all the usual elements and some nice corners like the one leading into the Stadium, which has a cool atmosphere with all the fans. Overtaking is pretty good, especially as you have a long back straight going into a hairpin, which always provides a passing opportunity. It can be hard on the tyres and even in Qualifying, you have to make sure you look after them on a single lap, or the tyres can be shot by the last couple of corners. The tarmac is old, so the surface is much rougher than at some of the newer re-surfaced circuits. It’s something we will be keeping an eye on.”
Daniil Kvyat
“In the last round at Silverstone, I made a good recovery in the race to score points at the end of what had been a difficult weekend up until then. The most important thing is that in the race we were on top of the situation and the pace was really strong. Hopefully, we will be able to carry this momentum into Germany and then Hungary the following week. I think Hockenheim could be quite good for us, even though the competition in the midfield is very tight. We will need to be on top of everything. It’s a bit too early to tell if our performance in Silverstone was the start of an upward trend, as every race seems to be a bit different to the previous one and conditions at Silverstone were quite different to those in France and Austria. Germany will be an interesting challenge for us. I’m not expecting it to be easy, but we will try our best as always to be in a position to score points.
As Hockenheim was off the calendar for a while, I haven’t been there for a few years. Of course, I can remember the configuration and I’ve done some sim work for it. It’s a track I like quite a lot, with some enjoyable long, high-speed corners. There’s an old-school vibe about it, so it’s a cool place to be. And with a long history of German drivers in F1, the race usually has a big crowd to create a great atmosphere. In terms of what you need for the car, I wouldn’t single out one particular aspect, you just want a well-balanced car.”