Franco Colapinto reflected on the ‘tricky’ A526 after a significant shunt in the first half of FP2 at the Formula 1 Hungarian Grand Prix.
Colapinto brought out a Red Flag around the halfway stage of FP2 with a dangerous crash in the final turn of the Budapest track.
With the strong winds across the track, the Alpine driver spun into Turn 17. He headed backwards into the barriers, destroying the rear of his car and pausing the session. With 32 minutes left in the session, when the Alpine driver made contact with the wall, he missed out on vital practice time for the weekend.
While the amount of damage isn’t clear, it will be a long night for the engineers fixing the A526.
Colapinto told media, including Motorsport Week, about the incident, which he said resulted in a ‘short day’.
“Pretty short day. I think the cars this year, with the low downforce, are more and more tricky to drive. A track like this, with very low grip, feels quite difficult, of course.”
Franco Colapinto to explains issues strategy to recover weekend
Before his crash, Colapinto was on for two personal bests in the first two sectors of the circuit. However, with his incident, the pace he was capable of was cut short.
“Lost the morning, so that wasn’t ideal. Lost the rear in the last corner, and hit the rear of the car with the tyres. Not a good day, not an ideal start.”
Colapinto tried to look to the rest of the weekend, acknowledging how the time lost puts him on the back foot. It’ll be vital to have a clean FP3 ahead of qualifying for the Argentine.
“Lost quite a lot of track time as well. Trying to focus now on the things we can learn and try to improve for tomorrow.
“Of course, we don’t have a lot of data, but I think we can still work on it and try to put the car in a better window for tomorrow.”
The red flag also disrupted the wider session, with several cars caught out mid-lap on their soft-tyre qualifying simulations as the track was cleared. Ferrari ultimately headed the times once running resumed, with Lewis Hamilton edging Charles Leclerc for top spot, while Colapinto was left to end the session classified 21st, having managed just 11 laps.
Colapinto currently sits 12th in the standings on 19 points, with Arvid Lindblad just three points clear of him in 11th on 22. With the margins that tight in the midfield battle, every point is vital as the season progresses, and a lost Friday in Budapest is exactly the kind of setback Colapinto can ill afford heading into Saturday’s running.
READ MORE: Fernando Alonso reveals Adrian Newey ‘debates’ with over AMR26
Discussion about this post