Aston Martin team principal Mike Krack has jumped to the defence of Lance Stroll, who received further criticism following the Canadian Grand Prix last weekend.
The Canadian endured a challenging home race, given that he once again failed to progress to Q3.
Stroll was eliminated in Q2 after only salvaging 13th, although a three-place grid penalty for impeding bumped him back to 16th.
To give the 24-year-old credit, he did recover to finish ninth, meaning he gained an impressive seven positions during the race.
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Whilst Krack was pleased with Stroll’s performance, the driver came under scrutiny once again, due to Fernando Alonso having finished second.
Alonso claimed his sixth podium of the year at the Circuit de Gilles-Villeneuve, keeping him third in the Drivers’ Championship.
Stroll is certainly nowhere near Alonso in terms of outright performance, with Krack admitting that “on paper” the Canadian’s results don’t “look good”.
“In qualifying, he struggled very much with the lack of grip, and then when you don’t have confidence, it’s very difficult,” Krack told Motorsport.com.
“Now, on paper, it doesn’t look good. You finish ninth, and your teammate second. But if you see where he started, I think it was very good.”
Krack was keen to defend his driver though and praised him for fighting through a DRS train, with the Aston Martin boss having noted how Red Bull’s Sergio Perez struggled to get ahead of the train.
“He drove very well. We got him out of traffic, and then he drove the same lap times as the leaders,” added Krack.
“When you are in a DRS train, it is very difficult to drive from 16th place to ninth. It was a great performance, I think.
“Fast cars, like Sergio’s, showed how difficult it was to get to the front.”
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Whilst making up seven places is something to commend, Stroll needs to start finishing closer to his team-mate.
Until he’s matching Alonso the likelihood is that Stroll’s future will continue to be speculated; however, Krack is “confident” that the driver will be “very strong” in the coming races.
“We know he is very strong on high-speed circuits, and we have some of those tracks coming up. So I am confident that we will be able to score with both cars,” said the Aston Martin boss.