Renault F1 drivers 'not crashers'

Two crashes in Monaco practice for Palmer were followed by a violent accident on the start/finish straight as the wet race began in earnest after a safety car start, while Magnussen missed Canada qualifying due to a shunt on Saturday morning.

Palmer said the accidents showed the 2016 Renault was a tricky car to drive, but said Monaco should not be taken as a typical performance in an otherwise tidy year.

"Obviously it doesn't make us look good if we crash the car, and when the car's difficult to drive there's a higher chance to crash it," he said.

"I've only crashed the car one weekend this year - which was Monaco - but I did have quite a big one in the race, which was quite a unique situation, and practice I had two more as well.

"So Monaco was a very bad weekend but forgetting that one, I haven't crashed the car. And Kev had one in Montreal.

"It's not like we're complete crashing drivers. The car's difficult, especially on bumpy circuits.

"It's not easy to be pushing and trying to find the gains to make it to Q2 without making any mistakes and if you make the mistakes on those tracks then you're in the wall.

"I'm sure that as the season goes on people will realise that.

"We're not crashers so I don't expect that it will be theme of the year."

Palmer believes the Renault's difficult behaviour over bumps made mistakes particularly likely in Monaco and Montreal, but he expects that situation to ease in Baku this weekend.

"The car's not easy to drive. We're clearly missing a reasonable amount of downforce when you compare it to the Red Bull, which is probably the best car on the grid," he said.

"It's quite snappy, especially in Montreal and Monaco over the bumps we were struggling.

"The bumps are where suddenly the car can spit you and doubled with that, the walls are very close so I think that it exaggerated it.

"Here even though it's a street circuit, the surface looks very smooth so should be a lot better.

"Missing downforce plus being very edgy and difficult over the kerbs means it's extremely snappy.

"With the torque we've got, the car's not easy to drive at the best of times but if it's snappy and difficult over the kerbs then it's much harder."