Max Verstappen was not totally satisfied with his Friday at the Formula 1 2023 Monaco Grand Prix, despite ending the day fastest of all.
The champion went two-tenths faster than 2022’s Friday benchmark to top the times over Ferrari duo Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz – with the latter crashing his Scuderia into the barriers in FP2.
Verstappen was a disgruntled figure during FP1 as the ride in his RB19 prevented him from doing the lap he was capable of, but those issues were mostly ironed out for FP2.
“FP1 was quite tricky, I wasn’t happy with the ride of the car on the kerbs,” Verstappen told media including Total-Motorsport.com at the Monaco Grand Prix.
“FP2 was a lot better, the car was a lot more competitive but compared to Ferrari, we’re still lacking in the general ride of the car.
“How it handles the kerbs, the bumps, the drops, the camber. It’s still something we need to work on for tomorrow because they are very close.”
Aston Martin close
Although the improvements to the car’s ride did help Verstappen in FP2, he still believes more can be done, even though the driveability was still as good as it’s ever been.
He felt he was able to push harder in FP2 but thinks that the Ferrari duo and Fernando Alonso with Aston Martin could push him for pole position on Saturday if they don’t take another step overnight.
“The car was driveable, at least,” Verstappen added. “And that makes you able to put that lap in and push a little bit more.
“Overall, a difficult start but a good end. They’re (Aston Martin) close as well, so we definitely need to build a bit of a buffer if we want to be ahead of them tomorrow.”
