Lance Stroll had a fitting finish of his season with yet another strong performance, eventually finishing tenth after going long in the first stint of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. It did give him a brief stay in second behind leader Yuki Tsunoda, but eventually the safety car they hoped for didn’t come.
“Safety car would have been nice at that point for that moment in the race,” Stroll said.“Yeah, [we] stayed out really long, you know, hoping for something maybe to happen, try and score a lot of points on McLaren, if we would have that kind of safety car opportunity.
“But it didn’t come and then we just kind of ran our race and finished P10.”
The young Canadian finished fifth in the previous two races, but had to settle for the final point as soon as playing the long game turned out to be a less optimal strategy. Something Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz also found out by going really long in his second stint, which hindered Stroll.
“A lot of graining on the medium at the end, and then all of a sudden, Ricciardo was on my gearbox because I had Sainz that didn’t stop for ever,” the Aston Martin driver explained. “And then that created a lot of graining on the medium tyre.
“But yeah, I think we were on the front foot always, you know, kind of attacking and generally that’s been the situation this season, you know.
“Sundays being strong, the car has been strong and generally on the front foot on Sunday.”
The one-time polesitter was a bit disappointed that McLaren proved too fast in the final race, but could find some consolation in the fact that that was the case since the summer break.
“A shame McLaren was just quicker, which we expected this weekend. You know, they’ve been for the second half of the season.”
