Yuki Tsunoda had a good race last Sunday, finishing the São Paulo Grand Prix in ninth place after starting only 16th. But although you always hope for a good result, Tsunoda wasn’t afraid to admit he was surprised by AlphaTauri’s recent form.
“Yeah, big surprise. And I think we are a dark horse right now, especially [compared] with the other competitors.
“So I think it’s good, you know. So far we scoring points for three races in a row. Yeah, very good rhythm.
“Just keep doing like this the rest of the races, and now we’re close to P7 in the teams’ championship. So I think we can [get P7]. It’s possible and we do our best.”
Part of the recent upsurge is the upgrade brought to the United States Grand Prix at the start of the triple header, which did improve the balace a bit, but overall is just quite a bit quicker than before.
“Yes, I mean in the inside the car, I feel quite similar,” the Japanese driver explained. “Obviously I feel a better kind of balance.
“I would say the results say everything, that we definitely made a big step, especially the upgrade we had in Austin.”
Although the performance of the AT04 has improved, there is still a driver required to bring home the points, something Tsunoda almost failed to do for the second time in a row. He dipped a wheel in the grass in the Bico de Pato corner, but fortunately was able to continue his race.
“Yeah, that was a big, big mistake,” he said. “It was really scary. I actually shit my pants. Luckily I didn’t DNF.”
Teammate Daniel Ricciardo didn’t score any points, but despite his race being severely hindered by the start crash he too was able to extract good pace out of the AlphaTauri.
“[It was] unfortunate for Daniel in the end, you know. His pace was really good. I think we also changed the setups a bit and I think we got good data.
“He was quite fast so, yeah, I think it was really good overall.”
In the end, scoring points is all that matters in the battle for seventh in the constructors’ championship, and the recent string of results show that the upgrade brought in Austin is a succes, Tsunoda concludes.
“You know before Austin we didn’t score enough points often, and now we’re scoring three races. So that’s showing everything.”
