Sauber driver, Gabriel Bortoleto, hopes to regain strong form after his divebomb into Turn 1 at the F1 Las Vegas GP took Lance Stroll out of the race and effectively ended his own just one lap later.
After the race, the 21-year-old was found at fault for the for his Turn 1 move. Because of the Bortoleto’s retirement from the F1 Las Vegas GP, he was given a 5-place grid penalty for Qatar instead of a 10-second penalty.
Bortoleto apologies to Stroll for F1 Las Vegas GP crash
“Yeah, misjudged a little bit, the braking point. I think [braking] five metres [or] a bit earlier I would have probably stopped the car. I’m sorry for Lance, it was my fault.”
Adding on to that, the Brazilian rookie revealed damage was sustained and a decision was made to retire the car very early on.
“Yeah, no, it was a bit of floor. I think it was hitting a bit of the floor. So we preferred to not risk anything.
“The race was already over basically there, we were last. We had to change the front wing as well because it was leaning a bit down.
“So yeah, I mean, for the crash it was not a big damage, but it was better to retire the car and not risk anything.”
Bortoleto looking to bounce back strongly in final two rounds
With 5 points finishes in 2025, Bortoleto has slipped into a slump after a stellar rookie season. With back-to-back lap 1 retirements, the Brazilian driver has only 2 races left to finish well in 2025.
When asked if he could improve until season’s end, Bortoleto answered, “Well, yeah, I think I don’t want to be talking too much about the past or the year, you know. I know how great it was, but I need to focus on the future and what I can do better.
“The past is the past and I just want to, if I want to remember something of that, I want to get back to that form, you know, doing great qualis, having good starts, clean races, no incidents.”
The Brazilian continued, “I think in the last few rounds I have not been able to do this. And yeah, I just feel very bad for that because it’s never good to be ending the year in a struggle, but we still have two races to go to try to make a good result.”
Lance Stroll has no issues with Gabriel Bortoleto after F1 Las Vegas GP incident
Despite his race ending just one corner into the F1 Las Vegas GP, Lance Stroll understood the incident was a part of racing.
Lance Stroll reflected on the incident saying to F1TV, “Yeah, just hit at the start of the race, so that was it. I just got back, I was on the other side of the track. So yeah, it happens. I mean it’s racing, sometimes these things happen and that’s what it is.”
As there is 2 rounds left in this triple-header, Bortoleto has to learn from the mistakes of the last couple of races. With 4 points between Aston Marin and Sauber for P8 in the Constructors’ Championship, the Brazilian needs to rediscover his mid-season form.
