Pirelli's motorsport director Paul Hembery was excited by yesterday's qualifying session. Afterwards he noted that Lewis Hamilton was able to save a set of option tyres for today's race: "This qualifying session was one of the most tense of the season, with the final outcome hanging in the balance until the closing seconds. It's interesting to note that Lewis Hamilton has saved himself a set of supersoft tyres, so we'll see if he is trying a slightly different strategy tomorrow."

Hembery expect that most people will do a three-stop strategy: "I think that most people will decide to stop three times tomorrow, but the track is still evolving constantly and that should make some longer runs possible. It is good to see Sergio Perez in the top 10 too, so we should be in for an intriguing race tomorrow."