Carlos Sainz reacts to Melbourne practice: “Not at 100%, but I want to fight at the front”. Carlos Sainz opens up on his performance in Australian GP practice.

Carlos Sainz ended his day in third place with some signs of fatigue after two intense free practice sessions. Even though he’s not at 100% physically, the Spaniard is satisfied with how his day went and believes there’s still room for improvement. The hope for qualifying is to be in contention for the front rows.

After a weekend of rest following his appendix operation in Saudi Arabia, Carlos Sainz arrived in Australia hoping to get back in the car and rediscover those “classic” sensations behind the wheel of his SF-24.

As he had anticipated beforehand, his intention was to take part in the race, but he had also mentioned that he wouldn’t take unnecessary risks, stepping aside if the pain proved to be too acute.

Clearly, at the end of two free practice sessions, after a week of complete rest following the operation where he couldn’t train as usual, except for some minor exercises, the fatigue is noticeable. Additionally, the Spaniard opted for alternative solutions to avoid straining the area where he was operated, adding soft sponge under the belts to reduce pressure on the body.

At the end of the first day, Carlos Sainz’s assessment is still positive, although the physical effort has taken its toll. The Spanish driver finished over four tenths off the pace set by his teammate Charles Leclerc, but overall he expressed satisfaction considering the situation he was in last week.

“I feel good, obviously tired after the practice sessions. I’m not 100% physically, but I feel like I’ve had a good day. If someone had told me a week ago that I could do all the free practice sessions without major issues, I would have been very happy. So I’m very pleased with how it went. Obviously, I need a good night’s sleep and a good recovery for tomorrow. But yeah, I feel good,” the Maranello driver recounted at the end of the session.

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Having been unable to follow his usual training program between simulator sessions and exercises, Carlos Sainz is trying to rediscover the limit of both the car and his body. His program has been about gradually rediscovering those sensations, and with more laps under his belt, the hope is to continue improving tomorrow to be in contention for an important result in qualifying.

“I think today Charles was particularly fast. For my part, of course, I’m taking it one step at a time and I managed to get into the rhythm, not pushing the car to the limit and not pushing myself to the limit, but I believe that with more laps and gaining a bit more confidence with the car, I’ll be faster tomorrow.”

“And I hope to be able to fight for pole position alongside him against everyone else, because I think it will be very close. We saw in FP1 how close we all were. I think we made a good step forward in FP2. But I think tomorrow’s qualifying will be more similar to FP1, and we’ll all be closer,” Carlos Sainz added.