Jonathan Wheatley reveals Sauber being in critical phase due to the double crash of both Gabriel Bortoleto and Nico Hulkenberg in Brazil GP.
It was not a good Brazil weekend for the Sauber pair, especially in the sprint. Hulkenberg initially spun out early on when multiple others did. Towards the end, Bortoleto crashed out as well while trying to overtake Alexander Albon. It was a hefty crash for the Brazilian in his home event.
The team managed to Hulkenberg in qualifying but Bortoleto only started in the grand prix. He had another Lap 1 incident in Qatar which only hampered their spare parts situation. It was not revealed at that time that the Swiss F1 team had issues on spare parts, but Wheatley has done so now.
While crediting the team work, he noted how they handled the situation well to see-through the season. “We’ve recovered from damage, which I didn’t talk to you about, but we were at a critical moment at one point because of the amount of damage that had happened [in Brazil],” said Wheatley to media.
“The team showed spirit on an incredible level and not just what you see here at the track, the people at the factory that got the spare parts out here to us. If you’re a team principal of a Formula 1 team, what more could you ask for than that?
“It was just amazing that the driver not only walks away from that but was actually ready to qualify. We could have got the car ready. So we face challenges on every level. Every single team cannot leave a single stone unturned this winter [to continue pushing on],” summed up Wheatley.
He also addressed the surprise bouncing that Bortoleto faced in the last race in Abu Dhabi, which dropped him out of the points. “Yeah, we need to understand it because he was complaining about bouncing and frankly you normally get some indicator of it the course of the weekend, it might be something you need to address,” he said.
“We’re stripping the car, we need to try to understand what happened, but we suspect something’s happened to the car. I don’t want to speculate, but I mean sometimes it’s a heat damper, sometimes it’s something like that. Something doesn’t add up,” summed up Wheatley.
