Canamasas´ race 1 wreaked by first corner pile-up

The Barcelona-born driver had his chances in Azerbaijan ruined by a multiple car pile-up in which he was caught on first lap. Canamasas, unbowed despite setbacks, vows to never give up and expects to put in another of his trademark recovery drives.

Sergio Canamasas wasn’t able to translate his good qualifying result into points during GP2 Series´ feature race held at the Baku City Circuit today. On the streets of Azerbaijan´s capital, Canamasas made a positive start to the weekend and finished in practice top 10. Later in qualifying session, it was halted by several yellow flags and Canamasas stopped the clock at 1:52.962 after several aborted attempts. At the start of the race, Pierre Gasly has crashed into Norman Nato, the latter spinning and Gasly breaking up heavily. Behind, Canamasas couldn´t avoid collision.

“We were expecting good results, but sometimes things don´t work the way they supposed to. My pace in qualifying was good enough for a top-five result, but luck plays a big part here, just like at Monaco. I was forced to abort several fastest lap attempts. Maybe with a better qualifying result I wouldn´t have got involved in pile-up. Really it was impossible to avoid crash”, Canamasas underlined. Besides, he stressed that “Gasly hit Nato at the start. Nato spun and Gasly hit the brakes very, very hard. In the cockpit of a GP2 car we have low visibility. I wasn´t expecting Gasly would break like that and I wasn´t aware of Nato´s car ahead. So, it was not avoidable. It´s frustrating but we never give up. Passing moves are much easier here than in Monaco, I like the track, and we have new chances on Sunday”.

Sunday´s sprint race will take place at 12.00 PM (CET) on Sunday.