Challenging first day for Caterham rookie Stevens

Will Stevens had a difficult first day in Abu Dhabi on his F1 debut with Caterham, but ultimately the Briton settled in well, even though he was off the pace of Kamui Kobayashi by seconds.

Renault 3.5 race winner Stevens knew the track from GP2 testing, which was a head start.

“I had been waiting for this day to arrive for a very long time,” he said. “It didn’t start as well as I had hoped for, as a small technical issue meant I had to jump out of the car after only competing my installation lap. Luckily, the team did a great job and it got sorted out rapidly, meaning I could spend the rest of the day focusing on getting to grips with the car and completing as many laps as possible.

“In this afternoon’s session I already felt much more comfortable. We now need to work hard tonight and go through all the data gathered so that we drive out tomorrow well prepared. I’m happy with my race weekend so far, it’s definitely a steep learning curve, but I’m ready for the challenge and I want to thank all the fans out there that believed in the team and got us here to race.”