Carlos Sainz records remarkable F1 recovery after 'Wall of Champions' crash

Carlos Sainz believes he achieved the best possible result Toro Rosso had hoped for coming into last weekend’s Canadian Grand Prix despite starting a long way back on the Formula 1 grid.

The Spaniard had been driving aggressively, and quickly, across the three practice sessions at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve and looked set to score a good result.

But a crash into Montreal’s ‘Wall of Champions’ during Q2 meant he qualified 16th (15th after his teammate Daniil Kvyat had his Monaco penalty was applied), which became 20th when he received a five-place grid drop for using a new gearbox.

But Sainz recovered to finish in the points in yesterday’s race thanks to his decisive passing in the early stages and demonstrating the rapid pace required by the aggressive strategy calls from his Toro Rosso squad to help him rise up the order.

"If you had told me before the race that I would have finished in P9 after starting P20, I would've probably signed immediately,” said Sainz after the race.

“I'm really happy to have made it back into the points, I enjoyed it a lot out there. We chose the right moment for our first pit-stop, going for the undercut, and I then did five or six qualifying laps on the Soft tyre, which allowed me to overtake five or six cars and keep up with the Force India.

“Even if I hadn't made yesterday's mistake in qualifying, more than a P8 this weekend was impossible, so we can be happy and satisfied with our weekend. A result like today's shows that we are strong and that we are constantly improving. Today we did the right strategy and good pit-stops, so I'd like to congratulate the whole team for this weekend, it's been great!"

Toro Rosso’s team boss Franz Tost praised Sainz’s performance in Canada and hailed his result as “fantastic” at a track the Italian team felt would not suit its car’s strengths.

He said: "If we take into consideration where we started, to finish today's race within the points is a great result. The team and the drivers did a really good job. Carlos drove a fantastic race.

“He overtook a few of his rivals during the first lap and thanks to a very good strategy and fast pit-stops, he was able to gain a total of 11 positions, scoring two valuable points for the team.

“Taking into account that this is a fast circuit that doesn't suit our car that well, we showed quite a good performance in general. The car was fast, the tyres worked well and we are now looking forward to the new track in Azerbaijan."

Sainz put in an eye-catching performance in Canada at a time when there is intense speculation about his F1 future.

As was outlined in this article, Red Bull does not currently have a large queue of young drivers lining up to race for Toro Rosso, which increases the chances of Sainz continuing for a rare third season with the junior team next season.

But Williams could also suit the 21-year-old and Ferrari is certain to be evaluating his suitability for a drive alongside Sebastian Vettel in 2017.

Kvyat: “it was quite a boring race”

In the other Toro Rosso, Kvyat could find little to celebrate after finishing 12th in yesterday’s race beyond achieving a clean race weekend.

He said: “If I say the truth, it was quite a boring race today. We were trying to fight for that last point with Perez, but they were just that bit faster and we didn’t manage to get in front of him.

“We then switched to the Ultrasoft tyres for the last stint, but the set didn’t quite give us what we expected and they got destroyed while battling with the other cars around us. Unfortunately, I spent most of my race stuck behind a car and in traffic. Luckily the next race is just around the corner, so we can start thinking of that straight away and forget about today.

“But looking at the positives, it was a clean weekend for me, something which I needed. We were able to finish the race, as well as get important data for myself and the team, to learn as much as we can. We now need to start showing some performance and I hope we do this starting from Baku next week.”

Although Kvyat noted the importance of avoiding another incident in Canada after a two high-profile crashes in Russia and Monaco that bookended his demotion from Red Bull, he will need to put in a better performance in the remaining races.

If, as is expected, Toro Rosso drops him at the end of the season the Russian will have to attract enough interest from another team to continue his F1 career beyond 2016.