Pierre Gasly pushed "everyone" to avoid engine change at home GP
Pierre Gasly says he pushed "everyone" at Toro Rosso and Honda to avoid having to take a new Formula 1 engine and subsequent grid penalty for his home grand prix
Gasly suffered a problem with his upgraded Honda engine in Canadian GP practice and reverted to the old spec for qualifying.
As Gasly was only due to start 16th in Montreal Honda fitted another new engine for the race, dropping him to the back and protecting him from a change and grid drop at next week's French GP.
Gasly said: "I pushed everyone, I pushed with Franz [Tost, team principal], I pushed with Jonathan [Eddolls, chief race engineer], I pushed with Tanabe-san [Honda technical director Toyoharu Tanabe], I pushed everyone.
"I said, 'OK, I want the new engine in the car'. Otherwise will be just too difficult a race and it's better to take the penalty here - we have more chances to finish in the points and also for France it is better because we don't start far back."
Gasly rose from 19th to 11th in Canada and while he would likely have scored points with a higher starting position he said the "good news" was it protected his home race.
"We still need to do all the free practices and everything there, but of course the first home race for me, on a track I really like, I want to do great there.
"With the upgrade, if we have a good car there, we can probably expect to have a good weekend."
Toro Rosso and Honda were buoyed by the upgrade, which centred on the internal combustion engine, introduced in Canada.
Gasly said more should be expected as they go to tracks better suited to the Toro Rosso chassis.
"Definitely the power unit is good," he said. "Chassis-wise we were not fantastic [in Canada], compared to Monaco [where Gasly finished seventh], or compared to even Barcelona.
"Our car wasn't the best for that track. I think if we manage to improve a bit the performance of the car, I think the power unit will give us really good chance to be more consistently close to the top 10 or in the top 10."
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