Guanyu Zhou and Alfa Romeo F1 Team Stake scored their second points finish of the 2023 FIA Formula 1 World Championship in Melbourne as they capitalized on a number of retirements and a late red flag.
Zhou and Logan Sargeant began in P17 and P18 on the back row of the grid because Valtteri Bottas and Sergio Perez started in the pit lane. However, the Chinese driver went on to make some impressive overtakes while taking advantage of the red flags to move through the pack.
“Ninth at the chequered flag is a good result, especially considering where we started and the challenging weekend we had. There are positives to take – we had a really good start, which is something we worked really hard on, and we didn’t do any mistakes in a race where there were plenty of spills.
Although Alfa Romeo scored points, it was evident they lacked the pace of some of the midfield runners, especially BWT Alpine F1 Team and McLaren F1 Team who showed pace throughout. Both Alpine drivers collided on the final red flag standing restart, and Zhou and Alfa Romeo were big beneficiaries allowing them to score their second points of the season.
“We kept it clean, kept out of trouble, and I was able to keep the pressure on Magnussen in the later stages, which in the end allowed us to get points. The conditions out there were difficult, the track temperatures were very low but we didn’t do mistakes and it is what matters.
“These are my first points of the year, always a nice reward in a tricky place like Melbourne. Now we will need to keep improving and hopefully add more points to our name in Baku and beyond.”
Valtteri Bottas Not Happy with, “off the pace”, Alfa Romeo
Bottas wasn’t happy with Alfa Romeo’s pace in Melbourne, with the ten-time race winner finishing outside of the points for the second time this season.
Despite not being pleased with the team’s pace, Bottas was happy for Zhou scoring his first two points of the season from a chaotic race in Australia.
“I’m happy for Zhou and the team to come back with two points from what can only be described as a chaotic race. My afternoon had been quite lonely and without much action – until it all kicked off towards the end.
Bottas spoke through his strategy in Melbourne, and how the constant stoppages in the race cost him. Bad luck was a constant theme throughout his race, and his first pit stop before the first red flag put him at a major disadvantage to everyone else.
“We decided to take a risk at the start, and I pitted for hard tyres on lap one: the plan was to keep those tyres for the whole race, but then the red flag meant I couldn’t get much advantage from that. Later, when the safety car came out, we went for softs, but yet again the red flag messed up with my strategy. It’s been a hard weekend, we have been off the pace since the start, but we’ll make sure to look into that in the gap before the next race.
“I am actually glad to have some time before Baku, to get back to the drawing board and get back in a more competitive shape.”
Credit: XPB / James Moy Photography Ltd / Alfa Romeo F1 Team Stake