Stroll reveals reason behind bizarre Japan radio call

Lance Stroll has revealed how the "wrong rear wing" was to blame for his bizarre radio message in the Japanese Grand Prix.

The Canadian reported to the team that "it is unbelievable how our speed is on the straight," before adding "it's like a different category" as his voice appeared to break at the same time.

He would go onto finish in 12th place on a weekend to forget as he struggled with the AMR24, being knocked out of the upgraded machine in Q1.

Reflecting on the radio call, Stroll pointed to the different specification of rear-wing he and Alonso were running as the culprit.

"It was really tough with the straight line speed, we just had the wrong rear wing on the car," he told media including RacingNews365.

"I had to do all my overtaking into Turn 6 and I couldn't pass anyone on the straights because of the lack of speed.

"Overall, with qualifying and the race, it was one of those weekends to forget."

Stroll's poor weekend came after a strong outing in Australia, where he out-qualified Alonso for the first time this season and finished ahead, once the two-time champion had been penalised.

Boss Mike Krack defended his driver, and pointed to the lack of straight-line speed being down to tyre life and traction.

"It is something I have looked at, and across the field, we see a very small difference in terms of straight-line speed," he said.

"But what you have at different times of the race, there are different tyre conditions and the acceleration out of corners is different, and I think these comments come from such situations.

"We also fell foul a little bit of our programme and organisation, and [Lance] lost time with the [broken] aero rake and red flag in FP1 and when he had the tyres, everyone was long-running and he was in traffic.

"We think we have found one or two things that would explain the difference [to Alonso] in qualifying and he was much better in the race."