Tsunoda reviews Spanish GP outing after sustaining 'big damage' in Sainz clash

Yuki Tsunoda endured a race to forget in Madrid, as the Racing Bulls stand-in finished down in 14th on a day that could end up being his final Formula 1 start.

After being hit by Carlos Sainz at the first corner, he was left driving a damaged Racing Bulls car and thus never had a chance to make any progress.

The Madring was Tsunoda’s third outing as replacement for Liam Lawson, who in turn was drafted into Red Bull to deputise for the injured Isack Hadjar.

Tsunoda put himself back on the F1 radar with a solid P11 in the Dutch GP, and by subsequently scoring a point with P10 at Monza.

Another good run in Madrid would have further strengthened his case to return to a race seat in the future and it looked good on Friday when he finished FP2 in eighth, his team mate Arvid Lindblad having demonstrated the potential of the VCARB 03 with P4 before his big crash.

However, when it mattered in Qualifying on Saturday things drifted away from Tsunoda and he could qualify only P15.

“Yesterday, I knew there are a lot of places I can improve, from the car and everything,” he said after the session. “Something didn't really click today. Just pace was not there at all.

“Somehow, just it degs a little bit in terms of car pace. I just didn't feel any tyre grip, even sometimes it felt old tyres were better than new tyres. Something felt very odd, so I have to find out why. In general, I just didn't have grip.”

That misfortune continued into Tsunoda’s race day, which was compromised from the start when he was hit hard on the left side by Sainz.

Not only did he lose spots to Alex Albon and Sergio Perez, but he also sustained damage that made it even harder for him to find a way past the Cadillac driver.

“Pretty much the race was finished by that,” he said after the flag. “I lost a lot of positions by that, but also I had a big damage from that. Honestly, it was very difficult to overtake here, even though I had a still good advantage to the car in front in terms of pace. But just a really pressurising race, honestly.”

While the Racing Bulls had the potential to be faster than Perez, there was nothing that Tsunoda could do. However, when Perez pitted under the VSC, Tsunoda was able to find some performance.

“I mean, suddenly the car got cleared in front, and the pace suddenly recovered a lot. And to be honest, considering that damage I had, the pace wasn't that bad. But yeah, it was super difficult to overtake here.”

At the chequered flag he was in P14, which was not what he wanted on a day when Lindblad finished P9.

“In general there's something this week that wasn't easy at all,” he said. “And being unable to, I would say, solve the issue that I had since FP1, probably for me that issue got worse and worse throughout the week. So yeah, something to review. I mean, in the race, nothing I can do.”