Practice report

A difficult Friday for Sauber in Sepang

Technical issues and bad weather affected Sauber practice.

In free practice two of the Petronas Malaysia Grand Prix the Sauber F1 Team drivers Nico Hülkenberg and Esteban Gutiérrez finished 13th and 14th respectively.

Both drivers were able to improve in the second session of the day, although Esteban lost time because of technical issues.

Nico Hulkenberg, Sauber

Photo by: XPB Images

Nico Hülkenberg (1st Practice: 14th / 1:39.054 min / 17 laps - 2nd Practice 13th / 1:38.068 min / 31 laps): "All in all it was a difficult Friday. I don’t know what to make of it yet. I think we still have a lot to do until the next session tomorrow.

It’s a tough call, because I was not able to get a proper long run due to the weather. I think we still have potential in terms of the balance of the car and we have to wait and see what happens tomorrow.”

Esteban Gutiérrez (1st Practice: 15th / 1:39.204 min /16 laps - 2nd Practice 14th / 1:38.645 min / 23 laps): "From a set-up point of view it was a very productive today. We were able to improve the car from free practice one to free practice two in terms of its balance.

Then unfortunately we had several issues, but we managed to get back on track to use the time we had. I didn’t have time for a proper run with the medium tyres, but getting some laps in the wet and then changing back to dry conditions was very positive.

Tomorrow we have to catch up on the time we missed out on today.”

Tom McCullough, Head of Track Engineering: "It was a pretty typical practice day here in Malaysia. Rain in P2 was not ideal, but it was the same for everybody. We also had a few technical problems.

On Esteban’s car the fire extinguisher seems to have gone off. We also had a cracked exhaust, and we are investigating both those now.

With the improvement of the track between P1 and P2 and the set-up changes we made the drivers were happier, but we still have a lot of work to do before tomorrow’s qualifying and the race.”

Sauber F1 Team