Walk relieved to finish F1 Monaco GP after curb jumps “shook my brain”

TV cameras caught Stroll twice jumping over the curbs at the pool exit, where Charles Leclerc had a bad fall in the third quarter.

The second time, Stroll first cut off the inner barrier on the right, which – as with Leclerc – often leads to steering errors and strong contact with the barrier at the exit.

Stroll survived the incidents, however, and used an unusual strategy of a long opening stint on the hard tire to jump from 13th on the grid to eighth place on the flag and secure fifth place for teammate Sebastian Vettel.

“It messed up my brain a bit!” Stroll told Autosport when asked about curb jumping.

“I was a bit surprised. I thought my day would actually be over after the second.

“The first one I was able to save somehow, but the second one, I had a big punch inside. And usually we all know how it ends when you get a big punch inside, so I was pretty lucky. I used up my jokers there. “

Stroll admitted that he was worried about starting with the hard rubber and losing ground as he got temperature in the tires.

Lance Stroll, Aston Martin AMR21, crosses the line as Serena Williams waves the checkered flag with the tennis star

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

“It wasn’t ideal,” he said. “But I still had a pretty good start. And the soft tire runners didn’t really move too far away from me at the start.”

“So all in all, it wasn’t as bad as I expected or as difficult as I expected at the beginning.

“I think our race was on the tough track from lap 50 to lap 60, hoping a safety car or something would happen. And we actually managed to outdo the others, Esteban [Ocon] and [Antonio] Giovinazzi at the pace.

“I didn’t expect that before the race. I mean, I was expecting them to have a good pace this second stint and we might benefit from a safety car or something. But in the end we just had a good pace. We did it at a good pace. “

Stroll’s only concern was the threat of a penalty for crossing the line at the pit exit.

The team didn’t want to distract him by telling him about the investigation, but he found out for himself on the giant TV screen on Ste Devote’s path.

“I knew it was on the verge, but I thought I was going to drive Ocon, I heard ‘Ocon drive’ so I pushed pretty hard but in the end we were six seconds behind him when we left the pit lane”, said Stroll said.

“They didn’t actually tell me on the radio, but I saw it on the jumbotron while driving. I saw ‘under investigation’.

“I did some good laps for it, I didn’t know, but in the end I had 30 seconds for the cars behind it, so a 10-second penalty would still be okay.”

Stroll admitted his result was helped by issues for other drivers, including pole sitter Leclerc.

He said Aston “still has some work to do” to consistently look for strong results.