MORE FRUSTRATION
Oil slicks Hartley’s hopes
When Brendon Hartley noticed his Formula One car’s high oil consumption, he knew his day was likely to end early.
The Kiwi was called to the pits on his 40th lap at the Brazilian Grand Prix after battling the oil consumption issue for much of the race, leading to his second consecutive engine-related retirement in F1.
Hartley was 17th when engine issues, which have plagued Toro Rosso over the last month, flared up yet again in the 71-lap race at Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace, won by Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel yesterday.
It was the end to a tough weekend for Toro Rosso who had engaged in a war of words with engine supplier Renault through the media during the practice sessions over who was to blame for the persistent issues.
Hartley was also forced to pull out in Mexico two weeks ago when his engine caught fire meaning his 13th place on debut at the Untied States Grand Prix is his only finish in three F1 starts.
The Mexico race was due to an oil fire and Toro Rosso team principal Franz Tost confirmed oil issues were again to blame in Brazil.
‘‘Unfortunately, we had to call in Brendon because of a high oil consumption which we need to investigate and which unfortunately didn’t enable him to finish the race,’’ he said.
Hartley admitted he was not surprised when the call came to park up in the garage.
‘‘We knew that there was a problem early on in the race, as I had to start transferring oil – I didn’t want to ask, but I had the feeling that we were not going to get to the end and we didn’t,’’ he said.
It was not the only issue that he had in the race.
‘‘I lost radio communication with my engineer for a long time, so that was tricky, especially during the safety car restart, trying to remember all the things I had to do. It took me about 10 laps to get the radio plugged in again – it was quite difficult to find the hole.’’
Hartley was forced to start in Sao Paulo in 18th due to a grid penalty after engine issues in practice.
‘‘I had a really good start and that was the first box ticked. I had to get around [Lance] Stroll because he sort of stalled in front of me, but all the procedures that we’ve been working on were really good. During the first lap I lost a place to Pierre, which was a bit annoying, but after that I think I drove a pretty good race,’’ he said.
He reached as high as 12th, before sliding down the pack and eventually out of the race.
Team-mate Pierre Gasly finished the race in 12th. The young Frenchman cracked the top 10 early on before falling back.
Gasly, who started 19th, was out-performing Hartley when both men were on the track.
Gasly’s best lap time was 1min 13.323sec on lap 61, more than one second faster than Hartley (1min 14.658sec on lap 29).
The Toro Rosso duo have one more race to endure with Renault engines - Abu Dhabi in two weeks before the team switch to Honda for 2018.
While it was a disappointing day for Hartley, there was no lack of action in the race, especially on the first lap.
Vettel pulled past pole-sitter Valtteri Bottas before the first bend and he would stay there for the entire race.
On the second corner Kevin Magnussen, Stoffel Vandoorne and Daniel Ricciardo came into contact. Ricciardo went spinning out, but was able to continue, while both Magnussen and Vandoorne were ruled out.
A couple of corners later Esteban Ocon and Romain Grosjean made contact with the former left with two flat tyres and out of the race. Grosjean copped a 10-second penalty for his role in the incident.
Hamilton, who had been forced to start the race from pit lane after a crash during qualifying, turned on the race of the day.
His remarkable drive saw him tight on the tail of third-placed Kimi Raikkonen for the final 10 laps as he battled for a podium finish.
Retiring hometown hero Felipe Massa held off Fernando Alonso and Sergio Perez to claim seventh place.