Zhou: I finally got the chance to perform in China

Guanyu Zhou is preparing for his first home Grand Prix: he made his Formula 1 debut in 2022 and in recent years the stage in Shanghai has no longer been on the World Cup calendar. The Chinese Sauber driver hopes that this Grand Prix will not remain the only home race of his career.

Guanyu Zhou: “It’s great that I finally got the chance to perform in my home country because I missed it in the past two seasons. I would like to get started on the track as soon as possible, although I obviously have difficult experiences this weekend.

I’d like to treat it like a normal race weekend, but there will be a lot of my fans here all day and I have a very busy schedule this week. The popularity of Formula 1 in my home country is growing and that is very nice to see. More and more young racers are appearing here – these guys are now 6-8 years old and are already beginning to get involved in motorsports, and some have even moved to Europe for this.

We get two chances to fight for points, and the new format of the weekend, with sprints, seems interesting to me, even if there is very little time for training. But since we have been able to show good race pace lately, I don’t rule out that we can earn something if we manage to avoid problems on Friday and prepare well for qualifying.

There is a very intense rivalry in the middle of the pack, so our job is to do everything right and take advantage of all the opportunities that arise. Of course, the most important thing for me is that I can fully concentrate on completing my own tasks and trying to get the most out of the car we actually have. Although I must admit that I am not very familiar with this circuit and have never driven it.

But I still think we will have a chance to fight for the points, especially with this format of the weekend. And let’s hope that this home phase will not remain the only one in my career, because I intend to stay in Formula 1 as long as possible.”