Nyck De Vries qualifies second for Racing Engineering today at Yas Marina

24/11/17 Nyck De Vries qualifies second for Racing Engineering today at Yas Marina.

It was warm and sunny today with air and track temperatures of 27° and 41° degrees respectively at the Yas Marina circuit, Abu Dhabi for the Friday morning Free Practice of the eleventh and final round of the 2017 FIA Formula Two Championship. Pirelli are supplying their P Zero Yellow soft compound and Red supersoft compound tyres for the weekend and the Racing Engineering drivers, Nyck De Vries and Gustav Malja, were using the soft compound for the forty-five minute session.

Nyck was immediately setting fast times and he went 3rd with a time of 1:50.550 on his first quick lap which he then improved to 1:49.211 to move up to second and Gustav was also going well, and his first fast lap was a 1:51.806 which he quickly improved to 1:50.536 to lie 9th. With just over fifteen minutes of the session gone both cars returned to the pits for some set-up changes and both men were back on the track with eighteen minutes still to go. Gustav immediately improved to 1:49.874 for 10th before returning to the pits while Nyck concentrated on running laps to give the team data on tyre wear for tomorrow’s race.

The thirty-minute Qualifying session took place at 19:00 local time under the Yas Marina permanent floodlighting system and the air and track temperatures had fallen to 25° and 29° degrees respectively. Nyck and Gustav were now using the Red supersoft compound Pirelli tyres, but they deteriorated quickly on this surface and were generally only good for two flying laps making it critical that a driver did not to make any mistakes when pushing at the limit. Nyck quickly set a good lap time of 1:48.385 for fourth and Gustav went tenth with a time of 1:49.294. Nyck set a personal best on the opening sector of his next lying lap but traffic on the final sector meant he was unable to improve his time.

After fourteen minutes both Racing Engineering drivers returned to the pits for a new set of Pirelli supersoft tyres, returning to the track with seven minutes of the session left. Nyck was really flying on his new tyres and he set a fantastic lap of 1:47.387 to move up to second fastest and Gustav improved to 1:48.671 in the dying minutes of the session.

Tomorrow’s Feature Race will see Nyck starting on the front row of the grid and he will be determined to give Racing Engineering their first win of the season while for Gustav, who will start 18th, it will be a case of trying to gain as many places as possible to obtain a good grid position for Sunday’s race.

©FIA F2 Championship

©FIA F2 Championship

Team Comments:

Thomas Lassus – Race Engineer: “The front row start of Nyck’s car is really good, but having Gustav on the other end of the grid leaves us with mixed feelings. We were confident after free practice in the morning. Nyck dropped to 10th after his first run, but good communication with him allowed us to analyse our real pace and make the correct decisions for run 2. It’s good to see Racing Engineering back in the front row in Abu Dhabi and it’s all down to the work done by the team for all these years. We are looking forward to tomorrow, hoping to recover positions with Gustav and obviously we’ll be going for everything with Nyck. We will concentrate on preparing for tomorrow’s race now as we take nothing for granted.”

Nyck De Vries: “We had a good start into the day with free practice, where we prepared for qualifying, but also focused on the race, nevertheless, we knew the conditions would be significantly different this evening. We spent a long time together analysing what we did in free practice, I think we worked well together ahead of qualifying. However, my first run was not really smooth and I was not satisfied with my own performance. Sector-wise on the first run it looked OK, but the actual lap time was quite a long way from pole. I knew we had the pace and it was just a matter of a few adjustments and me putting it all together - and that’s what we did. There was no margin, we went for one push lap. And that was it. I think we almost succeeded, but I am happy to start the last Feature Race of the season from the front row.”

Gustav Malja: “Unfortunately, this was once again a bad qualifying. We didn’t get it right and I didn’t have a good feeling in the car. This makes it hard to perform and the results show that it wasn’t a good session. I am confident we can bring it back to the top tomorrow with a strong race. My aim is to finish in the top 8 and we will work hard tonight and tomorrow to see what we can do.”