18/09/2016
NEWS STORY
Romain Grosjean's weekend from hell has just got that little bit worse after the FIA confirmed a 5-place grid drop following a change of gearbox.
The Frenchman has had a torrid time of it thus far in Singapore, having crashed twice in addition to suffering a number of technical issues.
Indeed, unhappy with the updates to his car, Grosjean asked for them to be removed as he struggled to find any confidence in the car.
"Since we started running here the car feels weird," he said. "I have been trying a lot of different set-ups.
"We lost FP1 but that is something else," he said, referring to an air intake issue that meant he failed to post a time. "I don't know, it is very weird, it is not normal to put it twice in the wall in two days and not understanding what is going on. Something is not going quite right.
"Confidence is shit, close to zero," he admitted. "When you spin once at high speed and the second time you spin under braking, it is hard to get any confidence.
"We are looking at the data to see what we can do. We are checking what the car is as well after the crash and what are the damages, and then in the race hopefully the first few laps are good and we can build from there. But clearly I am not going to attack much in the first few laps."
To add to his frustration, following his team's decision to change his gearbox after his Q2 accident, he has been handed a five-place grid penalty, meaning he starts from 19th.
Check out our Sunday gallery from Singapore, here.