Pierre Gasly (AT02-05, Car 10)
Third Practice Session – Best lap: 1:31.583, pos. 3^rd, 13 laps
Qualifying – Best lap: (Q1) 1:30.848, (Q2) 1:30.513, (Q3) 1:29.809, pos. 5th 

“I’m really pleased with my performance today, it’s one of my best qualifying positions I’ve had with the team. For the first race of the year it’s important for us to show some good potential for the season ahead and I think we’ve managed to do that today. Only using the medium tyre in Q2 was a huge risk, but we managed to make it work, and hopefully we can use this to our advantage tomorrow in the race. I’ll try to make the most of the position we’re starting from on the grid– I think there’s clearly an opportunity for us and I will do everything possible to get as many points as I can for the team.”

Yuki Tsunoda (AT02-06, Car 22)
Third Practice Session – Best lap: 1:32.709, pos. 13^th, 15 laps
Qualifying – Best lap: (Q1) 1:30.607, (Q2) 1:31.203, pos. 13th 

“I’m a bit disappointed if I’m honest, I showed I had the pace on the medium tyre in Q1 and I felt confident with our strategy going into Q2, but I just didn’t have the grip during those final laps. It’s a shame to not be starting the race further up the grid but we know the race pace is there, so let’s see what we can do tomorrow. I’ll analyse the data tonight with my engineers, ahead of the race tomorrow, as I am continuing to learn from every lap that I complete. There are still lots of positives to take-away from today – it was my first Formula 1 Qualifying session and I’m feeling confident in the car. I think we’re still in a reasonable position and have the potential to make our way forward during the race.”

Jody Egginton (Technical Director):

“We were fairly happy with the performance of both car’s this morning – having dealt with the problem on Yuki’s car overnight – and both drivers seemed happy with their cars during FP3. Qualifying takes place during cooler track conditions here in Bahrain, but both cars performed well in Q1. Yuki and Pierre completed strong laps on the soft tyre, so we decided to optimise the race-start sets, by having both cars on to the medium tyre for Q2. Pierre made that work – he was one of four drivers to get through to Q3 on the mediums – however, Yuki wasn’t able to extract the best from the tyre in the second session. He’s put in a really good performance already this weekend, so I’m really pleased with that. Pierre had two strong runs on the soft tyre in Q3 and is starting in a good place tomorrow to pick up some great points. I’m really looking forward to the race now.”