While Nico Hulkenberg racked up a best of eighth in his second practice race, Paul Di Resta was far from his best, as he eked out 12th and 11th in that order. However, both the drivers and the team engineer Jakob Andreasen averred of a better performance in the qualifying.
Driving for the first time on this track, Hulkenberg saw off a dreary first practice session, wherein he finished 14. In the second session though, he was more at ease with the track. “It was my first experience of the Buddh circuit today and I have to say they have done a really nice job. There’s a good flow to the lap and the second sector is very technical and challenging. The programme for me today was quite straightforward because we managed to do everything we wanted. I completed a decent long run on the soft tyres this afternoon and I think we are quite well prepared going into tomorrow,” he said.
However, Di Resta wasn’t as unconcerned. “It was not an easy session for me. The balance is still not perfect and we need to work hard tonight to try and improve that
before final practice. The main issue of the day was the puncture I picked up half-way through FP2 because I missed out on my high-fuel run on the soft tyres. Also, it was hard to get a clean lap during my low fuel run because the track was so busy. We’ve got data with the other car but it would have been helpful to have run more laps and got a proper feel for the soft (tyre),” he said.
Andreasen believes the car can perform better in the qualifying session. “The circuit was quite green this morning with very low grip so that made it difficult to learn too much. The priority was to get Nico up-to-speed quickly and pick up some data on a few test items, which all went to plan. “The afternoon was less straightforward, largely because Paul picked up a puncture after his low fuel run on the soft tyres. That meant he missed out on his long run. Fortunately we got all the data we needed with Nico’s programme, but it certainly put Paul on the back foot,” he explained