Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsForce India

Perez: Force India ‘a couple of steps behind’

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Sergio Perez says Force India is “a couple of steps behind the competition” but insists the team will make quick progress.

Force India only launched its 2015 car - the VJM08 - just before the lunch break on Friday afternoon. With only two and a half days of running with the new car possible before the end of testing, Perez says the team was always going to be playing catch up but already knows where it has to improve over the coming weeks.

“It was exciting to find out about the new car,” Perez said. “It was so good that we had a reference from the old car. Obviously we are a couple of steps behind the competition, we only had two days; that’s a reality, we cannot hide it. But I think it was a positive start.

“I think it will take us a couple of races to get where we want to be, but the most important thing and something that makes me feel a bit more comfortable is we have a very clear direction on where we have to improve the car and the steps we have to make as a team to improve the car.

“So that makes me a bit more comfortable but it’s a lot of work ahead of us and we are a couple of steps behind our competition.”

Perez only drove the car on Sunday, finishing the final day of testing with the sixth fastest time, 2.1s behind Valtteri Bottas’ Williams.

The final day of testing as it happened

Click here for the gallery from day four of the final test

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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.