Kaltenborn 'supported me so much' - Wehrlein

Pascal Wehrlein feels he has "definitely" lost a supporter following the departure of Sauber team principal Monisha Kaltenborn this week, but refused to answer questions on driver equality.

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Amid suggestions from within the team that Kaltenborn was also unhappy about an alleged desire from the new owners to favor Marcus Ericsson, Wehrlein was asked if he feels he has lost an important supporter following his own injury troubles earlier this year, to which he replied: "Yeah you can say that definitely.

"She supported me so much, our relationship has always been really good and will be good in the future as well. Monisha was very close to me at one of my toughest times in my career so far when I had my injuries. She helped me a lot there, so I am very thankful for that, of course, this something I will never forget."

However, Wehrlein refused to answer questions on whether he felt he received equal treatment to Ericsson from the team, only confirming he had not been expecting the team principal to leave.

"I was very surprised. I spoke with Monisha on Tuesday evening, she called me and she told me about it, and of course I was really surprised about it.

"Me personally, I try to do my best and perform at the best level I can perform and extract the maximum out of the car. So this is my approach for this weekend and I think for the whole team, everyone has to do his job and move forward. We did the track walk, we did our meetings, so as normal as we would always do it. We just try to do our best.

"I don't know [how destabilizing it is], the weekend has just started. Obviously everyone is asking questions. If it's good or bad or what has changed in the team. I think the drivers are not the right person to comment too much on it. I am just doing my job and I want to perform as good as I can, and everything about this is not part of my job."

On whether there was a different atmosphere in the team following Kaltenborn's departure, Wehrlien replied: "Difficult to say... It feels different but it's hard to explain what is different or how it's different. It's different, yes."