Esteban Gutierrez feels F1 star suffered ‘purely bad luck’ in Mexico City GP incident

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The Mexico City Grand Prix was a superb race for Carlos Sainz, who took victory for Ferrari ahead of Lando Norris.

Behind the Spaniard, there was carnage further down the field as some driving standards were penalised and Max Verstappen was given two 10-second time penalties.

Sergio Perez also had a difficult day at his home event, getting a penalty at the start for overshooting his grid box and parking his car too far forward.

The Mexican is now under even more pressure as Perez failed to meet Christian Horner’s target of scoring points for Red Bull at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez.

At the start of the race, there was also drama which caused a Safety Car for the second consecutive race weekend.

Esteban Gutierrez, Mercedes’ development driver, explained to the F1 Nation podcast that one driver wasn’t at fault after being caught up in an incident.

Esteban Gutierrez feels Yuki Tsunoda had ‘bad luck’ with his Mexican Grand Prix start crash

Yuki Tsunoda endured a difficult time in Mexico after crashing in qualifying and damaging his car in Q2. This cost him and the 24-year-old’s Visa Cash App RB teammate Liam Lawson, who had his own incidents in Mexico, a chance to break into the top 10.

The Japanese driver was then caught up in an incident as the cars headed towards Turn 1 on the opening lap of the race.

On the pit straight, Tsunoda was in the midfield towards the outside of the track but got collected by Alex Albon after Frenchman Pierre Gasly kicked off a chain reaction.

READ MORE: Martin Brundle gives ‘honest’ verdict on Yuki Tsunoda and Alex Albon’s Mexico City Grand Prix crash

It was a very unfortunate incident that Tsunoda could do little about and it was also very costly for RB in the Constructors’ Championship. Haas are now 10 points ahead of them in sixth place with four race weekends to go.

Gutierrez explained the RB driver was unlucky as Albon made contact with Tsunoda in the opening stages of the Mexico City Gp.

He said: “I think it was purely bad luck. There was a sandwich in there, and the car behind couldn’t go anywhere and just clipped him on the wheel.”

RB are now under pressure to finish sixth in the Constructors’ Championship

RB are pushing to finish sixth in the Constructors’ Championship and are battling Haas, who have improved significantly over the season.

The American team have scored points at each of the last five races, enjoying a double points finish in Mexico City with Kevin Magnussen and Nico Hulkenberg.

With four race weekends remaining, there are a lot of points up for grabs as well as two Sprint races in Brazil and Qatar.

RB have improved after a difficult return from the summer break, but they may need some luck to intervene to overhaul Haas.