Carlos Sainz: I gave myself a few races to spare.

      Carlos Sainz's debut Williams race in Melbourne ended with a U-turn on a wet track behind a safety car and a wrecked car. On Thursday in Shanghai, the Spanish racer said that his lack of experience with a new car had led to this result.

      Carlos Sainz: "As you may have noticed, I was disappointed after the race, but soon I opened my laptop, studied the telemetry and pretty quickly figured out the reasons for what happened. This example shows how quickly a good weekend can turn into a bad one in our sport.

      When you don't know 1-5% of the features of a new Formula 1 car, 99% of the time it won't affect anything. But when there is a combination of several factors, when I found myself driving a safety car in Australia, it shows how important attention to detail is, ignorance of which can lead to serious consequences. We have drawn conclusions from what happened, and we already have a plan for what can be improved.

      Before that, I had never piloted this car on a wet track on intermediate tires behind a safety car. It was impossible to simulate such a situation at the Bahrain tests and then say, "Hey, there's something I don't like about the way the car is shifting into high gear, and it might get in the way in Australia." In my case, that's exactly what happened.

      There is very little that can be done to prevent such situations. I just gave myself a few races to spare, during which I have a very steep learning curve ahead of me, and things like that can happen. You can't be too hard on yourself when you gain experience."