Romain Grosjean was bidding to get himself out of the elimination zone at the end of the first stage of qualifying in Suzuka, when he lost control of the Haas and ended up in the barriers.
Grosjean was unhurt in the accident. However, the car suffered fairly extensive damage. The accident caused a red flag that resulted in a premature end to Q1. Meanwhile the driver himself was left trying to figure out what had caused the incident.
"The car felt really good on the first run, I was sure we could go in the top ten," he told reporters afterwards.
"The first run was actually really good, I had a big moment into turn 11, which lost me a lot of time on Kevin.
"I went for the second run doing pretty much the same thing, and the car just had a lot of oversteer for no reason.
"I attacked turn 3 a bit faster than I had on the previous lap, but nothing crazy," he continued. “It doesn’t really explain the fact that it went and I had a massive snap.
"I just lost it there and tried to save what I could for turn four. But it was too late," he added. "Then I was just trying to catch it in turn 4, but couldn’t really.
"I tried to keep it on track as much as I could, to avoid a crash. But I lost it a second time and had to go wide. Once I was on the grass, it was wet," he explained. "Then finally I ended up in the wall on the other side."
Grosjean said that they would have to look into the precise cause of the car's instability.
“I need to try to understand why the car was so good on the first run and then just went on the second one," he insisted.
"It’s positive that we made the right change for the first run from FP3. But it’s a shame, because I think we could have qualified in the top ten.”
Grosjean is provisionally in 13th place on the grid for Sunday's race, after penalties for other drivers are applied. It's not yet known whether Grosjean will himself face a grid drop as a result of repairs to the VF17.
"We have to see with Romain just how big the damage is on his car and if we need to change something that will give us a penalty," commented Haas F1 Team principal Guentehr Steiner.
"Otherwise, a tough, long day for the whole team," Steiner sighed. "It doesn’t seem that luck is on our side at the moment, but it will turn. We just have to look up and get ready for the race tomorrow."
Grosjean's team mate Kevin Magnussen progressed to the second round of qualifying and will start the Japanese Grand Prix from 12th place on the grid.
"We expected to be P16, P17 in qualifying, and I’m P13, to eventually become P12 for tomorrow," said the Dane. "So, I can’t be too unhappy with that.
"When it’s close like that though, you’d like that last bit, so it’s a bit frustrating not to get there," he admitted. "We’re still close to the points tomorrow. We’ll see if we can get in and score a few."
