- Malaysian GP - FP2
Ferrari stronger than Williams expected - Bottas
Valtteri Bottas is keeping a close eye on Ferrari after it showed much more Friday pace than Williams expected to see in Malaysia.
Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen finished the qualifying simulations in FP2 just four tenths down on Lewis Hamilton's Mercedes, with Bottas three tenths behind his fellow Finn. Bottas reported issues with his car on Friday but could not help but notice Ferrari's pace.
"It looks like Ferrari is perhaps a little bit stronger than we expected," Bottas admitted. "We know that we can improve a lot for tomorrow, we can still improve the car balance and obviously take out fuel and turn up the engine. Whether it will be enough, I don't know.
Asked if he was worried about Ferrari's pace, Bottas said: "Yeah, it looks like they are quite strong here , but we will see tomorrow. Tomorrow is qualifying and then we will see … We will see tomorrow whether what we still have in the pocket is enough, but it's a bit difficult to say. At the moment they seem to be a bit stronger for the Friday than we expected."
The No.77 car was hampered with car trouble throughout Friday.
Speaking of his race simulation, Bottas said: "It was not so good, it felt really difficult. But then during the running the team saw that there was damage to the car - a rear brake duct and some bits were coming off during the run. It didn't help."
Bottas, back in the car after being ruled out of the Melbourne opener with a small back injury, reported some discomfort on his return to a re-adjusted cockpit.
"I cannot say it's completely pain free, but the feelings are what we expected really. You feel it a little bit but the main thing is that it was not getting any worse and it was very consistent during the day and just a little bit of pain."
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