Stroll had a tough time at Suzuka after a disappointing qualifying round. He started the race in 16th place.
He made some progress during the race and finished 12th. But towards the end, as he was battling with Yuki Tsunoda, he got frustrated because Tsunoda’s car seemed faster on the straight parts of the track.
Stroll said, “It’s unbelievable how bad our speed is on the straight man. It’s like a different category!”
Some people compared Stroll’s frustration to a similar incident in 2015 when his teammate Fernando Alonso complained about engine performance.
But, unlike Alonso’s complaint about the car’s straight-line speed, Stroll’s issue was different. Aston Martin’s team principal, Mike Krack, looked into it and found that Stroll’s car didn’t lack speed because of the engine or aerodynamics. Instead, it was because other cars had better tires, giving them more grip to accelerate out of corners faster.
Krack explained, “What you see across the field is that there are very small differences in terms of straight-line performance. But what you have is that at different times of the race, there are different tyre conditions, and the acceleration out of the corners is a different one.”
He added that comments like Stroll’s often come from situations like these, where cars with fresher tires can accelerate differently.
Data from the Japanese GP race showed that the difference in speed between Stroll and Tsunoda was very small. At one point in the race, Tsunoda’s top speed was 304.8km/h, while Stroll’s was 303.4km/h.
