Guanyu Zhou says F1 pressure will be less than in F2 this season

Formula 1‘s latest rookie, Guanyu Zhou, has said that there will be less pressure on him this season than there was in Formula 2 last year given the changes in expectation levels.

The Chinese driver is the only new face on the grid for the 2022 season and he joins the sport at the beginning of an exciting new era, with all-new cars taking to the track.

Driving for Alfa Romeo, he’ll be looking to try and challenge for top 10 finishes if he can as the team looks to improve on a 2021 campaign that saw them on the periphery of the points at best most of the time last year.

He has Valtteri Bottas alongside him as a team-mate and that should give him plenty of opportunities to learn and improve but it sounds as though he is feeling pretty calm about the challenge that awaits him in the coming months:

“To be the only rookie on the 2022 Formula 1 grid, I think there’s, of course, a little bit of pressure, but it doesn’t really get to me because I feel [there was] more pressure last season,” he said.

“I had too many people watching me, having their eye on me, the end of my Formula 2 campaign. So that was a lot of pressure, but I think I dealt with that pretty well.

“I hope to achieve as many points as possible and try to always fight for the points, always [reach] Q3 for the team – I think that’s always the goal for the team.”