Sergio Sette Camara: McLaren run a bonus assessment

Making his McLaren debut on Wednesday, Sergio Sette Camara says his time in the MCL34 allows for a “kind of bonus assessment” that he hopes to take advantage of.

Signing with McLaren as their 2019 test and development driver, Sette Camara had his first taste of the McLaren MCL34 on Wednesday.

He replaced Oliver Turvey for the afternoon session at the Circuit de Catalunya but managed just 19 laps before car troubles stopping him out on track.

Although it wasn’t the end that Sette Camara had hoped for, the Formula 2 driver says he’ll grab every opportunity he’s given to show what he can do on the big stage.

“You are always being judged,” Camara told Crash.net. “I always think I am mainly being assessed on my F2 season, which is not going very well, so that’s my focus.

“But I see any interaction with the F1 team as a kind of a bonus assessment. I’m trying to just do the best job I can.

“In the test, teams are always looking for consistent, mature drivers that are 100 percent guaranteed to make a productive test, and there’s not many drivers like that because a bunch of them have racing programmes that don’t fit with F1, or doing other things.

“It’s good to be one of those drivers in case I find myself in the future with not many opportunities, I will be a good fit for a role like that, so it’s always good to do a good role wherever you go.”

Sette Camara’s best time on Wednesday was a 1:21.565, leaving him bottom of the timesheets, 5.7s off the pace.

“Driving the McLaren Formula 1 car was an amazing opportunity for me today,” he said. “I was able to learn some new procedures, see how the car felt and do a few flying laps.

“It’s a shame we had to cut the day short, but from my side I learned a lot and I’m really happy to have had the chance to drive a car like that.

“Thank you to everyone at McLaren for the experience and I hope to be able to repeat it again in the future.”

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