Although Felipe Nasr saw the checkered flag in Melbourne, the Brazilian was stumped by the handling of the C35 chassis and its overall lack of pace, disadvantages which look to stick with Sauber at Sakhir this weekend.

“The Bahrain Grand Prix is a special race weekend for me,” Nasr admitted however.  “Having Lebanese roots from my grandfather, I have always liked being in the Middle East.

“For me as a driver it is nice to not only get huge support from Brazil, but also from where we are. The track itself is great fun to drive and to race at night makes the event even more special.”

Support from his fans may not boost the Brazilian’s prospects however given the Hinwill-based outfit’s current performance level.

“To be honest we are lacking pace on the car, we are lacking a lot of performance compared to our other competitors,” he recently explained to Autosport.

“There was no way we could have finished the race in the points. It was way too far for that, which means we have a lot of work to do.

“Hopefully we can bring updates as soon as possible. There are many areas we should improve because we are talking pure, pure performance.”

Unfortunately, Nasr isn’t expecting substantial progress any time soon which will only increase the gap with rival teams which will evolve.

“We are going to be facing some difficulties until we do get this car updated, and I mean bring more downforce to the car, setting it up right and getting a proper rhythm on everything.

“There are still some things we can do, homework, and hopefully we can bring this performance back to the car and try to fight for the upper places on the grid.”

“For sure, they [the other teams] have taken a much bigger step than we thought. There is a lot to catch-up on our side, and on the financial side we are still struggling on that.

“But hopefully we can make up on things. We need to start adding more performance in the car. That is what we are looking for.”