Yuki Tsunoda believes he would have led the Brazilian Grand Prix had the protection automobile and subsequent purple flags not been referred to as for at Interlagos.
The Japanese driver was certainly one of a choose few to go for a swap to excessive moist tyres as rain pelted the Sao Paulo circuit, with he and team-mate Liam Lawson at one stage lapping quicker than these round them by virtually 5 seconds per lap.
However with others attempting to courageous it out on intermediates because the deluge acquired heavier, race management had no different aside from to ship the protection automobile out on observe, a neutralisation that grew to become a full red-flag stoppage as soon as Franco Colapinto had crashed his Williams catching as much as the pack after a pitstop.
Tsunoda, who was working third earlier than his pitstop, misplaced out with F1’s guidelines permitting at no cost tyre modifications underneath purple flag circumstances and would finally end eighth on the street – a end result that was upgraded to seventh courtesy of a 10-second penalty for McLaren’s Oscar Piastri, who had earlier punted Lawson right into a spin at Flip 1.
“I feel what we did, switching to excessive, that was good,” defined Tsunoda.
“Simply the protection automobile and the purple flag got here out, that was the purpose that went very down. If the purple flag did not come out, most likely I might, in some unspecified time in the future, have overtaken plenty of vehicles and possibly [been] P1, however it simply did not come in the direction of us.”
Yuki Tsunoda, RB F1 Staff VCARB 01
Picture by: Pink Bull Content material Pool
Lawson additionally scored factors as RB locks right into a combat for sixth within the constructors’ standings, albeit shedding floor to double podium-scoring Alpine.
Having burdened the significance of the end result for the Faenza-based group, Tsunoda added: “It wasn’t simple circumstances. In case you lose focus, [it can have] plenty of consequence.
“I loved the final stint, good combat with Oscar [Piastri]. I attempted to be inside 10 seconds. You already know, might have executed plenty of issues flawed, however saved it clear and tried to attain P7, which is sweet.”