The Thai-Brit kicked off the event by running second fastest in first practice, lapping only 0.095 seconds shy of pacesetter and eventual race winner Max Verstappen. He then classified only 14th in FP2.
In final practice on Saturday morning, Albon again troubled the lead Red Bull. He was 0.07s adrift of Verstappen to finish second, but again fell back to 14th in qualifying before racing to two points in ninth place.
Albon reckoned track temperature was the main factor behind these peaks and troughs all weekend.
He explained: “I was surprised, the pace [in the race] was not that strong. It was OK.
“I think a lot of that just comes down to the temperature of the day, the track was hot just like qualifying. We struggled when the track gets hot.
“So, there was a lot of management and in the race, I was having to manage too much to make the tyres last and that was affecting the lap time.”
Source: Autosport