Pierre Gasly said ‘it was a shame’ after retiring from the season opener at Albert Park due to a mechanical failure.
The Red Bull Toro Rosso Honda driver suffered an engine problem on the exit of turn 12 with smoke coming out from the rear of the car.
“It wasn’t a great start to the season for me.” Said Gasly. “After Turn 12 the engine just switched off, it came back on again but I was really slow and I couldn’t upshift.
“I tired to return to the pits and then I was told to stop.
“It’s a shame, especially since we didn’t have anything go wrong in testing.”
Gasly started from last on the grid after a mistake in qualifying at Turn 3 but had gained places early on in the race and ran as high as sixteenth.
The early failure was described as disappointing by the Frenchman who says that the team need to learn from the mistakes for the next race in Bahrain.
“I think everyone in the team is disappointed to have an issue at the first race but we need to look at the positives and learn from the negatives to come back stronger in Bahrain.”
