It wasn't the way he wanted to start his first Singapore Grand Prix, but Williams rookie driver lance Stroll was forced to sit in the garage for half of the opening free practice of the weekend after suffering a gearbox failure.
It was a failure of a development part, so it won't effect his race, but unfortunately it lost him the track time which was a double blow because the focus for him on day one was to learn the circuit.
The Marina Bay Street Circuit is a track Lance has never raced in before and one that takes a lot of experience to understand how to optimise, simply from a driving point-of-view.
FP2 saw a virtual safety car ruin his fast lap…
“It wasn't the best day for the team,” he said. “It was a tough Friday, especially for me with the gearbox problem in FP1 at a track I have never been to before, so that was not ideal. Then, in FP2 I had a virtual safety car on my best run, so that didn't help either. Not the luckiest day and for sure we need to improve the car and try to make it better for tomorrow."
"However, I really enjoyed the track here. It is a lot of fun to drive, a bit bumpy but also very challenging. I knew the track was going to be tight and twisty so I was prepared for that, but it is one of the toughest tracks mentally and physically, and also because of the heat.”
Both cars need to find more pace, however Felipe Massa is unsure if this can be done…
“Today was very difficult,” he said. “For sure, this is a problem I expected. To be honest, I'm sure qualifying is the main issue because we don't have the right laptime to fight, but I hope that maybe in the race many things can happen to help us here, so we will try everything we can. If we can get points on Sunday, it will be a very good job.”
