Sainz, penalized for the next GP, apologizes to Grosjean and Massa
Toro Rosso left Montreal with a clean sheet. Carlos Sainz was the unfortunate leader of the first lap, while Daniil Kvyat had to retire due to a mechanical problem with his car.
The start of the Canadian Grand Prix had gone rather well until turn number 3, where Carlos Sainz went on to collide with Romain Grosjean’s Haas before crashing like a missile into Felipe Massa’s Williams, thus ruining his race and that of the unfortunate Brazilian.
Found guilty in the maneuver, Carlos Sainz will start with a three-place penalty at the next Grand Prix in Azerbaijan, on the streets of Baku. The Spaniard, however, did not look for too many excuses for his mistake, except for poor visibility in his mirrors: « What a difficult start to the race! I had a good start and was in 12th position, trying to overtake Fernando on the outside of the second corner… He had more traction than me on the way out, so I focused on positioning to try to attack him at turn number 3, and all of a sudden, I hit a Haas that was on my right side… I have to say I never saw the car, it was simply a blind spot in my mirrors, so I never knew it was there. If I had realized it was there, of course, I would have been more careful and left space. Once we collided, I was just a passenger, I crashed into the wall, and it was the end of my race, unfortunately. I would like to say sorry, especially to Felipe, whom I hit… I just couldn’t do anything to avoid him. It was a big accident, but I am fine. » said Sainz, who did not fail to apologize to his two comrades on Twitter.
Apologies to @RGrosjean and as a consecuence @MassaFelipe19 Romain was simply on my blind spot and never got to see him. Glad we are all OK!
— Carlos Sainz (@Carlossainz55) 11 juin 2017
A race also very frustrating for Daniil Kvyat whose troubles began right from the start: « A very disappointing day. Our problems started already during the formation lap. My engine stalled, so I had to catch up with all the cars before the Safety Car line, which I didn’t manage to do and I got a penalty for that. But we were still aiming for 9th place. Our pace was really good today! Unfortunately, during my stop, we had a problem and we retired. It was too late to do anything after losing so much time in the pits anyway. I did everything I could do today, but what’s annoying is that every time we have very good pace, something happens or goes wrong. It’s very frustrating, we deserved a reward today. » concluded the Russian.
