In the first session of the day the aim was to hit the ground running given this is the first time I’ve returned to a familiar track on the Championship. The weather was dry and the condition of the track very good here with it generally being at its best in the afternoon, so we elected to run the entire morning session on used tyres. The three runs we had across the session went very well, and I was really pleased to come in 4th on the timesheet of the 14 drivers, and less than 4 tenths of a second off the top spot of the morning.
The first half of the afternoon session we used to prepare brake pads (bedding in), and then completed a run to work on a couple of areas of the track, again on used tyres.
For the final 55 min section of the afternoon session I used 2 sets of new tyres, as did all of the other drivers with the exception of some who did 3 new tyre runs. Thanks to the team the car has felt fantastic all day, and this was the same on the new tyres. After the first of the new tyre runs I was sitting on top of the time sheets for some time. In my second new tyre run I set the quickest first sector for the day, but ran into traffic for the remainder of that lap. However, I was really pleased to finish the session in P5 only 4 tenths off the top.
A long way to go this weekend, but a really good start today.
