Yuki Tsunoda says his confidence stage on the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix was not daunted by his crash late in Friday’s FP2.
The Purple Bull driver was having fun with a aggressive first day in Jeddah, virtually matching Max Verstappen’s time in FP1 after which setting the sixth-fastest lap of FP2 regardless of struggling to get his tires in the suitable working window. Though comfy pushing the automotive over one lap, Tsunoda then made an odd mistake on his excessive gasoline run to hit the within wall on the ultimate nook, breaking his steering and sending him into the surface barrier.
A expensive second for Yuki Tsunoda in FP2 😱#F1 #SaudiArabianGP pic.twitter.com/ofXpR5gG9q
— Method 1 (@F1) April 18, 2025
“I simply turned in an excessive amount of and clipped the wall with the within wheel and had injury,” Tsunoda stated. “After that I had no management. Apologies to the group as a result of the tempo was wanting good, so it’s a disgrace.
“Confidence stage was fairly good. The final smooth run was a bit compromised with the warmup and the whole lot. To this point fairly OK. I had restricted time with the long term — which was brought on by myself, so I can’t complain. I positively would have wished it to finish in a pleasant approach for certain.”
Whereas Tsunoda was glad together with his begin to the weekend, teammate Verstappen was much less so regardless of ending FP2 in a aggressive third place, 0.28s adrift of the quickest time set by Lando Norris.
“Nicely, we tried some various things with the automotive, tried to discover a completely different route with the automotive,” Verstappen stated. “We discovered rather a lot from it nevertheless it’s nonetheless not the place we would like it to be. Personally I don’t actually have a look at the gaps — on the finish of the day it’s important to kind your personal feeling and what you’re feeling within the automotive. Over one lap, it’s a bit higher however the lengthy runs had been very powerful for us.
“It’s completely different right here [compared to Bahrain] as a result of it’s a unique observe — grip ranges are completely different, but additionally the setup is totally completely different. It’s laborious to check nevertheless it’s clear we need to be quicker.
“I feel one standout is McLaren being very aggressive however from our aspect there may be nonetheless fairly a bit of labor to do and issues to know.”
