Saturday: Ericsson and Caterham F1 ahead of Chilton and Maldonado
The Caterham team achieves an excellent result by managing to surpass the Lotus of Pastor Maldonado and finishing ahead of Max Chilton driving the surviving Marussia. Marcus Ericsson, who is coming off a very good race in Japan, once again outpaced his teammate, who is admittedly lacking in track time.
Marcus Ericsson (No. 9) – 18th and 17th [16th on the grid]
After a good session of free practice 3, the Swede was quite confident heading into qualifying and achieved the best possible result, narrowly missing Q2. He states: « It was a great qualifying session! I did a lap and the car performed very well; we can be very pleased to qualify 17th here in Russia. It’s a bit frustrating to be so close to Q2, but overall we can be very happy with what we achieved today. »
He kept a thought for Jules Bianchi: « Of course, Jules is very present in our minds and our thoughts and prayers are always with him, it’s not an easy weekend emotionally, tomorrow we will all race for him here. »
Kamui Kobayashi (No. 10) – 19th and 19th
The weekend isn’t the easiest for the Japanese driver who was deprived of all the track time he would have wanted and who states that he is still in the learning phase of the circuit: « Having said that, I think I have improved a lot in a very short time here in Sochi and, even if my qualifying lap wasn’t perfect, we were able to qualify ahead of a Lotus as well as the Marussia. »
He keeps Jules Bianchi in mind for tomorrow’s race, which is a day when our thoughts and prayers will continue to be with Jules.
