Liam Lawson rues missed opportunity after 'painful' F1 experience

Liam Lawson has described his feelings of a "missed opportunity" during a "painful" Australian Grand Prix. 

From eighth on the grid, Lawson bogged down off the line and dropped to last as he began a recovery drive, making it to 13th by the flag as team-mate Arvid Lindblad banked points on his debut in eighth. 

Racing Bulls had enjoyed a strong showing through practice and qualifying, with Lawson in the mix with the team's midfield rivals Haas and Audi, which both scored strong finishes with Oliver Bearman in seventh and Gabriel Bortoleto in ninth, respectively. 

As such, New Zealander Lawson felt he had missed out on an opportunity to start the season strongly, as he recalled the "painful" experience of managing F1's new energy-dependent power units for the first time in competition.

"Honestly, it is not super fun to drive in the race; it is just constantly managing and running out of energy and slowing down at the end of every straight, so it can be pretty painful," Lawson told media, including RacingNews365. 

"We had some issues in the race, but I think without that, we probably could have moved further forward. It wasn't super clean for me; I wasn't really optimised with energy, it was very hard to manage.

"We had a good qualifying, but just need to get on top of everything else. 

"Fighting with the Haas and Audis is probably about where we are, and [in the race], I would have loved to have seen what was possible, especially with a couple of the top guys not finishing.

"It is frustrating to miss out on those opportunities, but I think it was a decent start."