Lance Stroll experienced a radio failure during the 2024 Las Vegas Grand Prix from the first lap of the race.
The failure hampered the Canadians’ chances during the race, starting from P18, as he failed to communicate with his team.
Stroll suffered from severe graining on the medium tyres—an issue many of his competitors also faced.
The 26-year-old struggled to convey to the team that he needed to pit sooner than planned.
Attempts to notify Aston Martin by repeatedly pressing the ‘pit confirm’ button failed. This led to the pit crew not being ready when he pitted on lap nine.
“Difficult race, no radio from Lap 1, so some miscommunication, well, no communication.
“That made it difficult at the pit stop and trying to tell them that I was coming in with the pit confirm.
“But the message didn’t go through.”
Asked how much race time he lost due to the failure to communicate with his team, to which he responded:
“20 seconds, so quite a lot.”
Stroll recognised that the medium tyre was deteriorating significantly at the start of the race. As a result, he wanted to switch to the hard tyre as quickly as possible.
“No, it’s the same in the car. I mean, there’s no problem in the car. It’s just the strategy in the pit stops.
“I knew that the medium tyre was dying a lot at the beginning of the race, and I wanted to come and go as quickly as possible on the hard tyre.
“But then our plan was to go longer on the medium tyre before the race, but the medium was worse than we expected, so I was trying to communicate that and tell them that I was coming in earlier.
“But then it was impossible, I mean, not impossible, just kind of impossible to communicate other than the pit confirms.
“So, yeah, just one of those races, too, not much to say.”
Team principal Mike Krack noted that the team eventually figured out how to “manage the race via the pit board,.” Stroll’s subsequent stop went smoothly.
Stroll finished the Las Vegas GP in P15. The Canadian thinks P12 or perhaps a few additional positions could have been achievable with the radio failure.
“I think P12 maybe, a few positions, because we lost 20 seconds, so we finished, I think, 10 seconds behind the two guys in front of us.
“So, a couple of positions there, but no points on the table today.”
The 2024 Las Vegas GP wasn’t the only race Aston Martin struggled at. While the radio failure was an isolated incident, the team has struggled for months, says Stroll.
“Yeah, like as expected, you know, it’s been tough for us for many months now, so it is what it is.”
Stroll reckons the race didn’t give new insights into potential development routes.
“No, I think we know what we need to develop, and it’s just about doing it and bringing it to the car.”
