While the final race in this Americas triple-header didn’t quite go to plan, it was great to see so many fans supporting us throughout the São Paulo GP weekend

With the Interlagos circuit steeped in history, it is always a special occasion to race in Brazil. And although the São Paulo Grand Prix certainly provided plenty of action, it was a challenging weekend to navigate, as the rain played a major part in proceedings.

Thanks to our partnership with Mercado Livre, our drivers wore special yellow and blue fireproof overalls for Brazil, bringing a splash of colour to an otherwise overcast setting. Both Pierre and Franco also wore one-off helmets to match their racesuits, with Franco opting for a navy and yellow design, while Pierre’s featured green colourways inspired by the Brazilian flag and his admiration for racing legend Ayrton Senna.

Before the track action began, Franco joined the two Brazilian drivers, Gabriel Bortoleto and debutant Rafael Câmara in Thursday’s official FIA Drivers’ Press Conference. He spoke on a variety of topics, including his own F1 debut, the growth of the sport in Latin America, the huge number of fans supporting him at this race, and his thoughts on Senna, also an idol of his.

A Mini guide to Interlagos

After lapping the Autódromo José Carlos Pace on a bicycle on Thursday, Gabriele Mini returned to the cockpit of the A526 for Friday morning’s FP1 session, getting his first taste of the famous circuit at speed.

Despite rain showers being forecast, conditions remained dry throughout the three practice sessions of the weekend, allowing the car to show a strong turn of pace. Gabriele completed 28 laps in FP1, covering 121km. Building on his running in Mexico City a week earlier, the Alpine Academy driver looked increasingly comfortable in the car and impressed with the seventh-quickest time on his Soft-tyre run. Meanwhile, Franco finished the session in P9.

“I learnt a lot of things last weekend in Mexico City, so I knew a few areas I needed to work on heading into today, which was very useful,” said Gabriele. “I began the programme with some aero testing and then moved into some performance running. I felt the car was in a good place and I was relatively pleased with my push lap on Softs.”

In the second session during the afternoon, Franco set the 11th-quickest time, while Pierre — having handed his car over to Gabriele in the morning — finished P14. His time was not entirely representative of his pace, having locked up under braking on his first push lap before having to abort another timed run as he worked to find a better balance over the bumps and kerbs.

Appreciating the fan support

With São Paulo the closest to a home race for Franco, it was great to see so many supporters at Saturday’s morning Fan Forum, with many having made the trip to Brazil from neighbouring Argentina. Both drivers attended alongside the Ferrari duo, with a curious Lewis Hamilton even sampling a sip of Franco’s mate tea!

The positions after FP3 on Saturday morning mirrored those from FP2 the previous afternoon, although the drivers swapped places, with Pierre finishing P11 and Franco P14. There had been plenty of encouraging signs during the build-up to Qualifying, but the arrival of heavy rain brought a fresh challenge.

Qualifying had only just begun when Race Control deemed conditions too poor for running to continue, with a red flag delaying the session by just under an hour and a half. When the cars were finally allowed back on track on the Extreme Wet tyres, both Pierre and Franco faced a difficult task in finding grip.

The timing and positioning worked well, with both cars crossing the line together right at the end of the session as track conditions improved. However, extracting the necessary performance proved difficult, with Managing Director Steve Nielsen admitting afterwards that the pace was “puzzling.”

Despite qualifying stretching to nearly two and a half hours in total, both cars missed out on progressing beyond Q1. It was the first time this season that Pierre had been eliminated in the opening phase of Qualifying, with the team finishing P17 and P18, Franco one place ahead of Pierre.

A race of mixed conditions

After a day of storms and warmer weather, Sunday brought a different set of conditions, with lower air temperatures and a constant grey drizzle hanging over Interlagos. Thanks to penalties applied to a number of drivers, we gained a few places on the starting grid. Franco moved up four places to P13, while Pierre started on the row behind in P15.

With the field starting on Intermediates on a wet track, both cars faced a challenging start and an equally demanding opening stint of the race. As the track began to dry, the key was finding the optimum moment to switch to slicks. While the middle sector was largely dry, however, the run up the hill out of Junção remained wet.

The crossover point eventually arrived, and both cars pitted on lap 17. Pierre made a second stop for another set of Softs on lap 37 (Franco did the same on lap 53) and showed strong pace in the drier conditions.

In a closely contested midfield battle, Franco was racing Arvid Lindblad and Nico Hülkenberg when the Audi driver went off the track at Turn 1 and rejoined just ahead of the Argentine. Hülkenberg was subsequently handed a 10-second time penalty for leaving the track and gaining an advantage.

Meanwhile, rain was beginning to fall again and, in the closing stages, both drivers returned to the pits for Intermediate tyres with a third stop on lap 61. Kimi Antonelli also stopped at the same time and was released into the path of Franco, who was entering the pit lane. Antonelli was handed a time penalty after the race.

In the final classification, Franco finished P13, with Pierre one place behind. While it was a challenging end to the Americas triple-header, there were positives to take from the weekend, not least the support from the fans throughout our time in Brazil.

Pierre also recorded the highest speed of anyone in the speed trap reaching 352km/h (218mph) on the straight. We head back to Enstone to review the data and analyse the weekend, before turning our attention to the streets of Las Vegas in a fortnight.