Through nine F1 race weekends this season, the Visa Cash App RB F1 Team has positioned near the front row of the midfield. VCARB is currently ranked 6th in F1. Constructors’ Championship standings: 28 pointsThey are 21 points behind seventh-placed Haas, and as the grid heads to Barcelona, some speculate that VCARB could be threatening Aston Martin and aiming for fifth place in the standings by the end of the season.
But VCARB is definitely expecting a tough fight at the Spanish Grand Prix thanks to the Barcelona track, which has been used for pre-season testing for a number of years due to its long straights and variety of corners.
As a result, many teams are bringing upgrades to the Spanish Grand Prix, which could make it a “highly competitive” weekend.
“Barcelona is always a track where everyone brings updates so I think it’s going to be a really competitive weekend, so let’s see what everyone does. I’m looking forward to driving in the quicker final sector, which was changed last year,” Daniel Ricciardo said during the team’s media preview. “I’m looking forward to going back to that track, which is usually quite familiar to me but we haven’t tested there this year so it should be fun.”
“I want to keep going like this and try to get into Q3 and get some more points. It’s been a while since I’ve waited but I see this as the start of my season and hope to perform like I did in Montreal,” Ricciardo added. “I’m really looking forward to it and can’t wait for Europe to start!”
Photo by Clive Rose/Getty Images
Yuki Tsunoda, who has earned 19 of VCARB’s points this season, is looking to bounce back after a disappointing result at the Canadian Grand Prix, where VCARB was in the running to secure a double points haul, but a spin in the closing stages saw him drop out of contention.
“The race in Montreal didn’t go as we wanted and the weekend as a whole was up and down, but the positives were that we were able to turn things around, from free practice to qualifying, going from one extreme to another. As a team it showed that we know how to adapt and we made it to Q3 again,” said Tsunoda. “It gives us a lot of confidence that we know how to turn things around and make them work!”
Tsunoda believes that getting a good feel for the team’s challengers early in the week will be crucial to success at the Spanish Grand Prix.
“Next up is Barcelona. It will be a tough test for the car, but so far this season the VCARB 01 seems to be running well on every track, so I have no concerns about performance. As for the track itself, sector 1 and sector 3 are different and you can’t have a car that is balanced on both, so you have to make compromises, but I’m not worried about that,” said Tsunoda. “The key will be to get a good understanding of how the package works on this track as soon as possible in free practice and make the most of it. This is also a difficult track to overtake, so qualifying will be very important again.
“I think I’ve been performing pretty well in qualifying in recent races. Maybe it’s because I’ve been preparing well in free practice, maybe it’s because I’ve been controlling my emotions, controlling myself well and doing it consistently,” Tsunoda continued. “That’s improving my driving and feedback and giving me confidence, so I’m looking forward to it.”
As mentioned earlier, many teams are bringing upgrades to Barcelona.
And VCARB is one of those teams.
“In terms of how we’ve approached the race, our recent results have been decent and we’ve scored some points,” said the team’s technical director Jody Eggington, “but the battle in the midfield is incredibly fierce and we’re under no illusions that we must deliver a well-executed event to get to the front of this group with a chance of scoring points. So, as with every Grand Prix, there has been intensive preparation in the simulator and offline tools in preparation for this event.”
“Faenza and Vista have worked hard to prepare and deliver aerodynamic updates to both cars, consisting of floor, bodywork and rear wing changes, which have delivered measurable performance improvements,” Egginton continued. “As a result of these updates, Friday will be a particularly busy session, in order to gather and process as much data as possible and prepare for Saturday and beyond.”
