For the Miami Grand Prix, Aston Martin cars will line up on opposite sides of the grid: if Fernando Alonso has to start the race from the front row, then Lance Stroll will be from the penultimate row. The results of the teammates in qualifying were influenced by not the most correct decisions made by the team and external circumstances.
Aston Martin tried to save an extra set of soft tires for the final session, hoping that both drivers would make it through the second part of qualifying by using just one set of tires in the first session.
But the track conditions changed very quickly, and only Alonso managed to cope with the task, while Stroll lost too much time in the third sector of the circle in his decisive attempt on tires that were already losing efficiency.
After qualifying, Mike Krak, the head of Aston Martin, admitted that it was not worth taking such a serious risk.
“We want both of our cars to be in the qualifying final, and there was no need to take so many risks,” Krak told The Race. – The team has certain statistics, makes some predictions, estimates its capabilities and tries to calculate the minimum time that will be enough to go to the next session. And we didn’t do that well enough.
We were probably too eager to make progress and wanted to keep an extra set of tires for the qualifying final. But now we must learn a lesson and act more correctly next time.
Still, our car is capable of a good pace. Even on the rolled tires Lance showed good lap times and we understand that the result would have been even better with a fresh set of rubber. Probably we could fight the Ferrari drivers, although this is not verified now. But I think it was possible to get into the top five.”
Krak also added that with Alonso starting from the front row and Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen starting the race from unusually distant positions due to circumstances, the two-time world champion will have a chance to fight for victory. However, Fernando himself assesses such prospects more cautiously.
Source: F1 News
I am Christopher Clyde, an experienced journalist and content writer with a passion for sports. I have been writing about Formula 1 news for the past five years and am currently employed as an author at athletistic.com, one of the top sports websites in the US.
