Valtteri Bottas is keen not to give up on his run of Q3 appearances in 2022 as qualifying for the Australian Grand Prix approaches. The Finn has had a strong start to his debut campaign with Alfa Romeo, having lined up P6 on the grid at the season-opening race in Bahrain before claiming a starting position of eighth for the Saudi Arabian event one week later. Having achieved this, Bottas sees no reason why his top 10 qualifying pattern cannot continue in Melbourne. "I think I need to keep my Q3 streak going!" Bottas said after Friday's Free Practice sessions at Albert Park. "I don't want to give up on that, so yeah, that should be the goal. I think it's realistic, but it's so close getting into [the] top 10, but I believe we have the car to do it if we set it up right."
Bottas explains "positive" learnings from Friday practice
Bottas ended the first of Friday's practice sessions in P10 on the timesheets, before moving up to seventh in the second hour's running. The 10-time race winner was left feeling positive about what the team had learned at the end of the day, particularly in terms of which tyre compounds are proving most effective. "The tyres, I think they work pretty much like we thought they would here," Bottas explained. "So, already with the Medium compound, there's a bit of a warm-up phase, so it takes a few laps to get the tyre to work. The Soft tyre works immediately, as expected, so nothing new. "We didn't really suffer with any graining in the long runs, so that's positive." The focus for Bottas will now be on perfecting the car's set-up ahead of Saturday. "[We] need to fine-tune the set-up," he added. "Try and find a bit more stability in high-speed, and then just send it!"
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