Toro Rosso
Pierre Gasly
"It was a good start as I managed to overtake Brendon and the first stint was great. I felt good with the car behind Romain and I was pretty close to him, but then we went too long on the first stint as we didn't want to pit into traffic but then several cars undercut us. We put the Soft tyres on during the pit stop and I enjoyed the battles and overtakes on the first few laps, but then I started to have massive blisters on the rear tyres and I was trying to survive at the end. It could have been better today so we need to analyse more deeply what happened. We probably didn't make the best decisions, but that happens sometimes, it's easy to say in hindsight that we could have made different choices. It's just a shame after such a good Qualifying yesterday, It would have been great to reward the team and Honda here in Japan for their home race with some points today."
Brendon Hartley
"I don't feel like I did too much wrong at the start of the race, but I just couldn't get the power down. For the whole first stint I didn't have much grip and poor traction cost me a lot of time. Then on the second set I found myself in traffic, I made a couple of overtakes on both of the Williams but in the end I got stuck behind Marcus. It's a real shame that both cars are outside the points after such a promising result in Qualifying yesterday."
Toyoharu Tanabe, Honda F1 Technical Director
"Today's result was disappointing, given our excellent showing in qualifying yesterday. Pierre ran in the points for much of the race, so it was unfortunate that he was unable to fight off Sainz in the closing stages and dropped down to eleventh. Since we arrived in Suzuka, we have had fantastic support from the Toro Rosso Honda fans, which was a great boost for all of us. So it was a shame that we were unable to repay them with a point or two. However, the frustration we all feel at the lack of points will be turned into motivation as we carry on working for the final four races and, at this point of the year, even looking to 2019."
