F1 News: The Real Reason Behind Sauber's Damaging 52-Sec Pit Stop At Bahrain Revealed
Sauber's Head of Trackside Engineering, Xevi Pujolar, has verified that the 52.4-second pit stop for Valtteri Bottas during the Bahrain Grand Prix resulted from a problem with the wheel nut on his C44 F1 car.
Key Takeaways:
- Sauber's Xevi Pujolar confirmed that Valtteri Bottas's 52.4-second pit stop in the Bahrain Grand Prix was due to a wheel nut issue.
- Bottas finished 19th, narrowly beating Williams driver Logan Sargeant, while Zhou Guanyu secured the 11th position, missing out on points.
- Pujolar highlighted the need to optimize pit stops and explained that the slow stop resulted from changing the wheel nut, with considerations to simplify the situation due to a damaged front wing.
Due to the long pit stop, Bottas could only manage a 19th-place finish, narrowly beating Williams driver Logan Sargeant. His teammate Zhou Guanyu fell short of securing points as he finished eleventh.
A front left wing issue arose on Bottas's car after contact with Nico Hulkenberg's Haas VF-24 at Turn 1, leading to his second pitstop on Lap 30. This significantly delayed him and dashed his hopes of scoring points in Bahrain.
Zeroing in on the root cause of the problem, Pujolar revealed that the wheel nut was responsible for the long pit stop, which had to be replaced. He told the media:
“We had an issue where we had to change the wheelnut.
“It’s something that we are working on.”
Speaking further on the extent of the damage, Pujolar explained why the front wing wasn't replaced during the pit stop. He added:
“We had damage on the endplate, so we lost a bit of performance there, but it was OK to continue without changing. It was better to keep it on the car.
“I think we had already enough going on [during the slow pit stop], so we just thought: first, focus on that one.
“We were losing a bit of performance. For sure, now, you say: ‘OK, if you [know you’ll] spend more time in the pitstop, you will do like it this, but we wanted to keep it simple at the time.'”
He subsequently addressed the need to optimize pit stops to enhance their efficiency. Pujolar added:
“We will have a look, for sure. We are working in all areas to try to optimise everything
“If you look at the pitstops with Zhou, it was good on that side. We have some pit stops where we can do better.
“But also looking at the pit stops on Zhou’s side, we were able to fight with competitors and keep position.
“I don’t think we have a problem there – we just need to optimise everything.”