Yuki Tsunoda caused a stir on Sunday during the Dutch Grand Prix, when he came to a stop twice during the race.
The AlphaTauri driver pitted for Hard tyres on lap 42, but soon came to a halt on the circuit, reporting that the tyres were not fitted properly.
However, he then crawled the car back to the pit lane, where the team re-tightened his seat belts before sending him on his way.
But Tsunoda reported that there was still an issue and stopped again, retiring from the race and causing a Virtual Safety Car to be deployed.
“Unfortunately, after I stopped for the Hards, I felt there was an issue with the car, the team could not see anything at that stage so they called me in to change the tyres,” Tsunoda said.
“However, when I went back out I could still feel there was something wrong, which the team then confirmed by radio and we had to retire the car.”
Expanding on just what felt off behind the wheel of the car, Tsunoda added: “When I got out, [when I] accelerated from the pit exit, I felt like only one wheel was having wheelspin.
“I was like drifting on the straight, like counter-steering on the straight. I didn’t feel it was normal.”
AlphaTauri Chief Engineer Claudio Balestri confirmed that the team is still investigating the problem that led to Tsunoda’s retirement.
“Having seen that the compound was working well, we decided to also pit Yuki for them,” he said.
“After the pit stop he reported something strange at the rear of the car, we called him in again to change the tyres and immediately after we had a car failure. This is currently under investigation within the team.”
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