Tsunoda reveals confusion over misheard “beaver” radio message

Yuki Tsunoda revealed he misheard a radio message warning about a loose mirror on the track during the Qatar Grand Prix and thought he’d been told there was a beaver.

The RB driver endured a frustrating afternoon at the Losail International Circuit as he slipped down the order after a good opening lap to finish 13th following a failed gamble to run soft tyres in the closing stages.

But speaking afterwards, he admitted to some confusion involving a mid-race message from his pitwall about what proved to be the loose mirror from Alex Albon.

Asked by Motorsport.com if he had seen the mirror, Tsunoda said: “Was it mirror? I heard beaver.

“My engineers said: ‘There’s a beaver.’ But why is there a beaver in the Middle East? Like how is it possible a beaver is in the Middle East?

“But okay, maybe there’s a surprise with global warming – kicking a lot of interesting things in the Earth.”

Red Bull boss Christian Horner joked afterwards about the difference between hearing mirror and beaver: “That is quite a change….”

Tsunoda admitted that he had not seen the mirror, but felt that the double yellows which had been brought out because of it were not being observed by all drivers.

McLaren’s Lando Norris was given a 10s stop-go penalty, for which he accepted fault after finishing 10th in the race.

“There was the double yellow and some cars behind didn’t really follow it,” he said.

“So we have to revise that in the next drivers’ briefing that some driver does respect it, and some driver doesn’t respect it. That’s very unfair.”

Lack of race pace

Tsunoda felt like a sitting duck for much of the race as he found himself swallowed up by rivals, having briefly got into the top 10 early on. The Japanese driver said he had never experienced such a bad race pace before.

“Yeah, I had a good start as well and I was P9, able to overtake [Fernando] Alonso as well after the safety car,” he said.

“But I never had like that much of a bad pace. I just gave it everything, you know, I was not even managing the tyres.

“In Qatar, normally it’s hard to overtake with the car behind, and it seems like a lot of cars [found it] quite easy to overtake me. Just generally a lack of pace, and it’s not even small.”

Tsunoda’s team-mate Liam Lawson finished 14th after a spin while battling Valtteri Bottas.