F1: Stroll shoves trainer as Alonso continues to school him (Update)
Aston Martin team boss Mike Krack was reluctant to comment after Lance Stroll threw a tantrum at Qatar.
Already in the paddock, there were rumors that his father Lawrence Stroll may be mulling over an offer to sell the team and potentially replace the struggling Stroll with Honda-linked Yuki Tsunoda.
Tsunoda said when asked: “I want to make it clear that I am with Red Bull.”
Indeed, Aston Martin has already confirmed 24-year-old Stroll for the 2024 season, so his petulant behavior after qualifying 17th must simply have been frustration.
With teammate Fernando Alonso qualifying a strong fourth, Stroll reacted by hurling his steering wheel out of the cockpit.
He then violently shoved his trainer Henry Howe and gave a seven-word interview to the television cameras – with one of them being an expletive.
Team boss Krack told Bild newspaper: “I haven’t seen anything yet.
“Before I comment on this, I want to see the situation for myself.”
Well-known Spanish-language commentator Antonio Lobato told DAZN: “The body language that we are seeing speaks of the situation that exists right now with Lance Stroll within Aston Martin.
“It’s a situation, of course, that is good neither for the team nor for Stroll himself.”
October 6, 2023
Lance Stroll has been schooled by his Aston Martin teammate Fernando Alonso all year, and rumors are rampant that his days in F1 are numbered.
–by Mark Cipolloni–
Billionaire father Lawrence Stroll bought his son an entire F1 team and built a state-of-the-art factory in the hopes his son will someday be a world champion.
It is now evident to everyone, including father Stroll, that Lance is not talented enough to ever be a world champion and there are rumors Lawrence Stroll may be thinking about selling the team.
Aston Martin is going to be beaten by McLaren in the Constructors’ Championship because Alonso is scoring almost all the points for the team. Since the summer break, Stroll has not made it out of Q1.
“I mean, they have the momentum now, they’re scoring a lot of points, both cars, and they are very strong,” Alonso told reporters after qualifying.
“Eventually they will overtake us, we will have to accept it and say well done to them. But so far, we’re still in front, and we will try to defend every race.”
After being knocked out in Q1 again in Qatar Friday, Stroll Shoved his performance coach in the Aston Martin garage.
With a margin of over 1.1 seconds to teammate Fernando Alonso, a frustrated Stroll climbed out of his car and went to walk to the back of the garage where his performance coach Henry Howe pointed him towards the pit lane to get weighed by the FIA, but Stroll brushed past him despite Howe’s attempts to hold him back.
Howe then stepped in front of Stroll as he turned to go out of the rear of the garage, and Stroll reacted by firmly pushing his coach as they disappeared from view.
It’s not cool from lance stroll plus also shoving away his personal trainer pic.twitter.com/1zxXZNK0nt
— NP (@F1pilar) October 6, 2023
Sky Sports F1 pundit Naomi Schiff reacted to Stroll’s outburst in the moments after it took place, and believes it’s no way for a driver to treat the team around them.
“Multiple poor performances in a row. On one hand, you look at this in slow motion, I mean, he really puts a lot of energy into that shove,” Schiff said on Sky Sports F1.
“And that’s really totally inappropriate. You cannot be behaving that way, no matter how disappointing your day has been.
“Those are the people who work to get you on track to make it happen for you. You can’t be treating your team like that. It’s one thing to have a bad day, come out of the car and apologize, but to come out and act that way, it’s just not good enough.”
Lance Stroll is in a mood, shoves his trainer and his interview responses are 7 words total pic.twitter.com/76mdAYzFuP
— CJ Fogler account may or may not be notable (@cjzero) October 6, 2023