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Sainz surprised by Toro Rosso pace in Monaco

Carlos Sainz admits he was surprised by the pace shown by Toro Rosso during Thursday's practice sessions ahead of the Monaco Grand Prix.

With both Toro Rosso drivers finishing the first practice session in the top ten, Sainz and team-mate Daniil Kvyat ended FP2 in the top six behind the Red Bulls and Mercedes. Sainz was expecting to be further down the standings but says he will not get carried away with the practice times.

“Yeah, it was also actually a bit of a surprise for us to be in front of teams like Ferrari or McLaren," Sainz said. "We knew that the package is there, the drivers are there, we just need to keep showing it on Saturday. Unfortunately it’s just Thursday and it counts little - like my P5 counted little in Barcelona on Friday - but we can build on that I think.”

Asked if he lost time when locking up at Rascasse on his best lap, Sainz replied: “A bit yeah.

"Like this on Thursday you are not over the moon like we were in Barcelona. The lock-up was just a small mistake but hopefully we find some performance a bit everywhere on Saturday.

"Also I’m convinced teams like Ferrari, Force India, Williams, McLaren will turn it up on Saturday so we need to be really careful. Thursday in Monaco there is always traffic, always drivers leaving two or four tenths, always set-ups you can improve, so who knows?”

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.