Lewis Hamilton managed to shake off major problems on a day when other drivers did have their fair share of setbacks, but he was not particularly impressed by the sequence of corners leading up to the long final stretch of the new Formula 1 compound.
The elevated chicane that makes up Turns 14 and 15, which runs under a motorway, has been designed to create errors that leave drivers open to possible attack by the driver behind them on the way to the final corner.
However, this ultra-compact nature of the complex, in which drivers must attack curbs at slow speeds, has not convinced the seven-time world champion.
“The track is quite nice to drive, except for the chicane,” said Hamilton. “It’s very narrow.”
“It reminds me of being in a B&Q [a British home improvement store] car park when I was six or seven years old, in a go-kart, weaving between the cars.”
“It’s a corner that maybe they can remove in the future, and it will improve the track.”
Hamilton also stated that he was not very happy with how bumpy the track was on the first day of the weekend.
“It’s a bit crazy when you think that people in this day and age should be able to make a flat road relatively easily,” he said.
“There were some really, really big potholes and a lot of places where the track sort of joins another. So I don’t know if they’ll be able to polish that overnight and make it better.”
However, not all drivers were so bummed out about the circuit, with Kevin Magnussen commenting that he actually liked the challenge of the chicane.
“It’s a cool area,” he said. “It’s not exciting in the same way as the high-speed corners, but it’s very blind and it’s like on a crest with big curbs, and a big change of direction at low speed.”
“I would say it’s pretty unique, so in that sense it’s great. But obviously it’s very slow.”
One of the main problems on the first day of action, which led to several incidents, was the dirt on the track surface. This meant that if the drivers went off the racing line, they were almost guaranteed to spin.
Red Bull driver Sergio Perez fears that if the track situation doesn’t improve, it doesn’t bode well for the race. His biggest concern is a lack of grip off the line, describing the feeling as like driving on gravel once the car comes off the line.
Valtteri Bottas, for his part, seems to be happy with the challenges posed by the track, and he predicted an exciting race for Sunday, unlike Pérez.
“It’s not an easy track,” he told Motorsport.com. “Definitely when the track is green, you can get by more easily [lose grip]. But once you get a little off the line, if you lose the rear, you can’t get it back.”
“It’s not easy to get that technical section right from Turns 12 to 15, but I think they’ve done a good job of overtaking opportunities.”
“I think we’re going to see good racing here with the long straights, and with them starting with a low speed corner, it means you can follow [other cars] closely.
