Yuki Tsunoda was unsatisfied with his final attempt in Q2 despite beating his season-best starting position with seventh at Formula 1’s Emilia Romagna Grand Prix.
Tsunoda has sustained a productive opening quarter to the 2024 campaign with three points finishes from the six races seeing him sit 10th in the Drivers’ standings.
The RB driver continued his impressive start to the term at Imola as he progressed through to the pole position shootout and out-qualified Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton.
But having clocked a time good enough to end the second segment situated as high as third, Tsunoda rued not optimising his last attempt as he settled for seventh.
“Yeah, strong results throughout the weekend and to be honest I’m not really happy with my lap in Q3,” he said. “I could have done for sure much better than that.
“But yeah, until then, the team gave me such a nice car since FP1 and feeling confident throughout the week.
“So without that I wouldn’t have been able to achieve this kind of one set in Q2. So I’m very happy and thanks for that.”
Tsunoda has conceded he has been taken aback with RB’s pace over a single lap across the weekend at Imola as he aims to convert it into a points return tomorrow.
“To be honest I didn’t expect this much performance from the car,” he proclaimed.
“But normally we’re driving at high speed, we didn’t see a big difference compared to the previous races, compared to the top five teams.
“So, for sure something we understand properly going forward. Because yeah, I mean, the amount and performance I didn’t expect, Maybe on race power, I don’t know.”
Tsunoda had pulled clear from a Mercedes at the last round in Miami, prompting him to express that Red Bull’s sister squad could strive to catch those teams ahead.
But while he accepts his recent exploits have vindicated such comments, the Japanese driver has cautioned that it’s not guaranteed this will translate to other tracks.
“I think that we started to actually be, I mean, top six, so, I mean, obviously this is a characteristic amount of how much we can sit well on the track,” he explained.
“But yeah, so far, every track is performing well. And since the Miami upgrades are performing super well, so it’s kind of confirmed.
“But at the same time, we always keep our minds sharp. We know that it won’t happen like this every time, so yeah, we just keep pushing.
“We know where we’re at, so we just keep pushing. Because the confidence levels in the car are much greater now than they were at the start of the season.
“It seems quite good because it’s slow to get going in the new year.
“Also, I would say from first place, there’s a lot of opportunity to score points. Being able to, personally, being able to do it properly.”
Daniel Ricciardo qualified in ninth to ensure that RB will have two cars starting the points places as it strives to extend its advantage over Haas in the championship.
“Yeah, I think all of the team are doing it very well,” Tsunoda assessed. “Just for us, just keep focusing to improve performance from the car as much as we can.”
