May 27, 2024

Early race mishap ends promising Catalunya GP 😕

Hi everyone,

After what was a promising start to the Catalunya GP, it was massively disappointing to crash out of the race during the early stages 😞

As a circuit, Barcelona is known for its low grip surface, which presents a unique challenge every time we show up here. The tarmacs usually a bit dirty as well, so these are real points of focus for us before and also during the GP weekend.

We were pretty quick during the opening practice sessions which falls in line with how this year has played out so far, earning a direct spot into Q2 after Friday which was nice. That’s always a pleasure and sets up for positive future sessions.

As for the Sprint Race, not the best day but also not the worst day. It was actually a pretty similar story to Le Mans in the sense of understanding the grip window. I was struggling with the last sector, and a quick buzz over the data showed we were missing some lean angle through there.

Wasn’t able to use the front as I would have liked, so again, really just trying to understand the grip window. We struggled to run the 39’s in the Sprint, which we were running comfortably in the sessions prior, which again is a head-scratcher.

Unfortunately, that all translated to what happened at (turn) 10 during the race. I got on the brakes but was pretty straight up and down - I was struggling in that final sector again - but got to the apex and it just went with no real warning.

Extremely disappointing for myself and the team to let them down - we’re striving to be better - so this isn’t ideal. All we can do is focus on what we can improve for Mugello especially in these warmer conditions and in race trim.