Sergio Perez thinks Force India can fight with Ferrari and Red Bull in Abu Dhabi after finishing third in FP2 at Yas Marina.
Perez turned in a surprising performance in the second Friday practice session to finish the best of the rest behind the Mercedes drivers. Just one tenth of a second split Perez, Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo and Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel and Perez thinks the team can maintain its strong form this weekend but is expecting Williams to also be a factor later in the weekend.
"I think generally Williams carries quite a bit of fuel, from what we've seen on Fridays for some reason," Perez said. "On a Friday they carry more fuel than all of us. I think we can give them a good run tomorrow. I think Ferrari will be strong, I think Red Bull as well, but I think we can be up there fighting with them."
Asked if his FP2 pace was genuine, he replied: "Yeah, the pace on the option felt alright for a single lap, it was a good lap. Obviously the Ferraris and the Red Bulls did their laps a bit earlier than us so there is a bit of track improvement there. But still it was a very strong lap which made me feel happy with the balance as well.
Perez admits work is needed on Force India's race pace ahead of Sunday's grand prix.
"Then on the long run we don't have a lot of information as I only managed to do six or seven laps on the prime tyre, we lost quite a bit of information on the long run. Not so happy in the long run pace with the balance, so that is something we have to analyse tonight to try and get the best compromise between qualifying and the race because obviously the race is the main priority for us over the weekend."