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Reuters

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Reuters

Yuki Tsunoda has had a better start to his second F1 season with AlphaTauri compared to his first. Tsunoda has already finished in points in three out of the nine races, important points for a midfield team. However, Tsunoda’s AT03 broken back wing gave us a hilarious bit of racing improvisation from the AlphaTauri team.

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The back wing of Tsunoda’s AT03 broke from the middle, a rare incident to witness during a race. This situation once noticed by the stewards issued Tsunoda a black and yellow flag. The flag translates to summoning in the pits for mechanical issues or loose bodywork which could be dangerous to the other drivers.

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The half-broken wing meant the Japanese had to pit from the top ten and retire the car. But AlphaTauri did not want to take that chance away from their driver around the 40th lap. However, this late in the race, the Italy-based team did not have enough time to fix the issue. And therefore, the team adopted an unorthodox strategy; improvise, adapt, and overcome.

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AlphaTauri, after calling Yuki into the pits, produced the single most brilliant piece of engineering. They used one of the most unusual things to fix the car, duct tape. AlphaTauri duct-taped Yuki Tsunoda’s back wing and sent him out to finish the race.

Twitter is in a frenzy after even F1 engineers use duct tape to fix their problems

As always, Twitter misses nothing and this piece of engineering brilliance from Baku caught everyone’s attention. And interestingly enough, the tape held onto the back wing at speeds as high as 215 mph. Tsunoda could not use his DRS for the rest of the race but managed to complete it.

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We wonder who convinced the team that a duct tape would work because AlphaTauri needs to promote that person.

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Duct ‘miracle’ tape can fix a lot of things, but little did we know it will be used in an F1 race. Pinnacle of racing or otherwise, duct tape can fix almost everything but, hopefully, AlphaTauri will resort to a more permanent solution for the next race.

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Apart from the broken wing, AlphaTauri can be happy so with Pierre Gasly finishing at P5. And if not for the broken wing, Tsunoda would’ve finished in points as well.

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Written by

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Mahim Suhalka

2,204 Articles

Mahim is a senior Formula 1 writer at EssentiallySports. With a Diploma in Sports Management, he ventured into sports journalism for his sheer passion for F1. Mahim has written over 2000 articles during his tenure at ES, and his expertise is in perspective pieces and core sports coverage. Mahim’s writing flair and meticulous research work have resulted in him contributing to in-depth analysis on teams like Red Bull and Mercedes as well as Team Principals Christian Horner and Toto Wolff. His support for Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 team and their #44 driver Lewis Hamilton came naturally after being awestruck by the brilliance during his foray into F1. You can follow him on X @MahimSuhalka.

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Arunaditya Aima

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