Brakes and low temps defeated Ericsson behind the safety car

Phillip van Osten 29/05/2017 at 18:0329/05/2017 at 15:02

Sauber's Marcus Ericsson says that a combination of factors contributed to his crash behind the safety car in the Monaco Grand Prix yesterday.

The Swede was ordered to unlap himself and proceeded to pass the safety car at Ste Devote but suddenly found himself heading straight for the barrier, putting himself out of the race on the spot.

"I had some issues with the brakes," he told Motorsport.com.

"Before the safety car period started, the brakes were overheating quite a bit.

"Under the safety car, and going really slow, they went really hot. The brake pedal started to get longer and longer and longer and I couldn't use the brakes.

"When I got the call to overtake the safety car, my brakes were not really working and my tyres were stone cold.

"That in combination with going around the safety car at Turn 1 - it was like slow motion - I couldn't stop the car and turn it."

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Ericsson echoed his colleagues claims that getting heat into Pirelli's tyres was a stuggle which, in his case, only compounded his brake problems yesterday.

"I've had this a bit this year, with the tyres being on the conservative side," he said.

"We've seen this weekend, every time you slow down a bit, you lose temperature so much.

"Then you need to work hard with the brakes to keep the temperature with the tyres. I couldn't use the brakes for three or four laps.

"Your temperature disappears completely. It meant that combination with the brake problem and the tyres being so cold made it what happened."

Despite scoring points in Spain two weeks ago, Ericsson says that Sauber is currently losing out at the tail end of the mid-field battle,

"We've been lacking in general a second a lap on the lower part of the midfield so it's been tough for us," said Ericsson.

"We were a bit better in the race on pace but too far off to do anything about it. We did what we could in the race, it was looking alright but it didn't end so good."

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