“Even through the last few years, which have been tough in terms of results, I take the example of Germany last year when we finished 9th, that was quite special,” he said. “German 2018, where we were 12th after the last saftey and we came through to finish 6th – that was quite cool.
“Even though you have a ‘feeling’ then, there is a feeling which I’d completely forgot about, [which is] when you get to a race weekend and you’ve got those butterflies because you know if you do everything right, you may end up on pole or trying to win the race.
“That’s definitely something I had no chance to do over the last few years.”
This was the first pole for Dale Coyne Racing since Sebastien Bourdais claimed first in qualifying at Phoenix in 2018. Grosjean’s delighted team boss Dale Coyne stated that he always knew his new signing had the ability – the ten-time F1 podium-finisher just needed to equipment to show what he could do.
“When you look at his resume and how great he was before he got into Formula One, and Formula One is such a team performance issue, we knew he could win races and we knew he could win poles,” Coyne said. “He’s proven it today.”
The GMR Grand Prix begins at 7:30pm BST. The Sky F1 channel will be broadcasting the race, with coverage beginning at 7pm.