Grosjean 14th as Maldonado hits more technical issues
Lotus' Romain Grosjean will start from fourteenth on the grid with Pastor Maldonado seventeenth after qualifying for tomorrow’s Canadian Grand Prix under blues skies at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montréal.
Maldonado was forced to park his car in the midst of the first qualifying session to prevent damage to his power unit, eventually earning him a reprimand as he left his Lotus without the steering wheel fitted on it.
Romain Grosjean, E22-03, 14th: “We expected a tough time in Canada but if you ignore the position on the grid I’m very positive as we’ve made good improvements with the car so it genuinely feels very good to drive. Qualifying was frustrating as we just missed out on gaining a couple of positions with another lap, but we wouldn’t have overcome our speed deficit down the straight. The race looks like it will be hot so tyre degradation could be an interesting aspect. The circuit is good and I like it as it's an intense lap where you have some tight moments in the car which always makes for a good race.”
Pastor Maldonado, E22-01, 17th: “We had a problem which meant that I was losing a lot of power on my last flying lap. The engineers asked me to stop the car immediately which was a shame as I think we would have been in a position to compete in Q2. Anything can happen in the race so we'll see how it goes. It's a long race and not a particularly easy track so it will be important to complete a good first lap and recover some places. Of course we will do our best and hopefully enjoy tomorrow.”
Alan Permane, Trackside Operations Director: "It wasn’t a great day for us. Pastor experienced a problem related to the turbo intake on his car in the first qualifying session which we are investigating. Romain missed the opportunity to set a faster lap than fourteenth as he crossed the line one second too late to start another lap in the session. We are investigating why this happened as we expected better starting positions from today.
"We’ve got everything to do tomorrow but there are some positives. Both drivers, and in particular Romain, have been happy with the improvements made to the car since Monaco and the E22 is a lot easier to drive than it has been in the past. This should be beneficial in the race as there is often a lot of attrition here. The weather was much hotter here today and is due to be hot again tomorrow which could mean there are opportunities to be creative with tyre strategy."
