Suspension failure behind Magnussen's problem

The Dane was forced to return to the pits with the left rear corner of his car, plus its deflated tyre, flapping around after an incident on track.

Formula 1's cameras had failed to capture his incident on television because they were focused on other cars, so it was unclear initially if the broken rear suspension was the cause of his issue or the result.

But following lengthy investigations by Renault, the team has discovered it was a suspension problem – and fixes have been put in place to ensure there is no repeat.

"It's being fixed and then we're ready tomorrow again," he said.

When asked to be more specific about the problems, he said: "A suspension failure - and then the tyre punctured after that. You sit down and then the tyre touches the floor and it rips."

No warning

Magnussen said that there had been no warning beforehand about there being a problem at the back of his car – which struck on the back-straight.

"I was doing 300km/h – 310km/h and then I felt the car drop," he said. "It started to dance around, so... yeah... no real warning in the corners.

"But it was fairly easy to control. It was straightline, not in a corner, so I just lifted off and stopped the car."

Lost time

Having not completed any meaningful running, Magnussen admitted his hopes of a first trouble-free weekend of the season had been wiped away.

"You don't always get what you want," he explained.

"I did the install laps and that was it. Some aero running - which was good, actually, but more for the data than, really, for myself. So we will be catching up tomorrow."