Pierre Gasly pinpointed an engine calibration issue and the wrong strategy as cause for Toro Rosso’s regression in race trim at the Japanese Grand Prix.
Gasly lined up from seventh position, with team-mate Brendon Hartley sixth, on Honda’s home territory.
Gasly remained within sight of midfield leader Romain Grosjean early on but was undercut by both Force India drivers, before being passed by Carlos Sainz Jr., and dropped out of the top 10, as he ran a Supersoft/Soft approach.
Gasly was also stymied by an engine calibration issue that Toro Rosso was not permitted to adjust, due to the car being in parc ferme conditions post-qualifying.
“In quali I had some calibration issues so I didn’t have the best setting and was hurting the reliability, was hurting the power, but also the reliability for the race,” he said.
“It was a pretty big concern ahead of the race so we ask them [the FIA] if we could change it.
“Then they first accepted and then after they reverted. I was backwards [to] qualifying’s setting which was a bit down on power and not ideal for driveability as well.
“[But] I think the race would have been good with only 27 laps but unfortunately it’s 53.
“We had a good start, managed to pass Brendon, [Sebastian] Vettel went through pretty quickly.
“The first stint was good, was P7, and then at the moment I don’t know why we pitted so late, because was seventh and then everybody started to pit, we stayed out on track.
“When we pitted I think I exited behind the two Force Indias, the two Saubers overtook me, one Williams overtook me.
“We fitted the Softs, which were good, I enjoyed the two or three overtakes I had after the pit stop, but really quickly we started to have massive blisters on the rear tyres.
“20 laps to the end I could feel lot of vibration and lot of blisters on the rear which just got worse and worse, and the last 10 laps I could not even see on the straight it was vibrating so much.”
Hartley went on to finish in 13th position.
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