Esteban Ocon failed to progress beyond Q1 when he damaged his car by hitting a barrier on his final flying lap.
But his error also had implications for the championship fight. As Ocon toured back to the pits, Lando Norris had to back off in reaction to a yellow flag, which meant he was also eliminated in the first round of qualifying.
The crash was the culmination of a tough weekend for Ocon. His first practice session was cut short by an MGU-H problem on his Alpine. Although he was able to run in the second session, another problem struck during the final hour of running before qualifying today. He came to a stop on the circuit due to a problem with his high pressure fuel system.
“It’s been a very difficult weekend, for sure,” Ocon told the official F1 channel. “I had pretty much no laps, maybe six valuable laps in the whole weekend. So it’s been extremely complicated to miss FP1 and FP3.”
The lack of running left Ocon unhappy with his car’s balance in qualifying. “I went to quali with no laps and no set-up adjustment, really, with the car,” he explained. “The car was difficult to drive, not really like I would have liked it to be.”
Ocon was trying to improve on his final run when he touched the barrier with his car’s left-rear wheel at the exit of turn four. After that he ran onto the run-off at turn six, then drove slowly back to the pits, at which point Norris caught him.
“Obviously I pushed the limits on that last lap and hit the wall and that was it,” Ocon explained. “I was on a improving lap, for sure, but it would have been a tricky one to get through anyway.”
He will start tomorrow’s race from the back row of the grid. Ocon said the team will need to have luck on their side to stand a chance of scoring points.
“We kept some [fresh] tyres for the race tomorrow in case something happens. We’ll trying to build on the best we can and hopefully have a decent race tomorrow.”
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2024 Azerbaijan Grand Prix
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