Liam Lawson has revealed to suffering from bitter frustration following a miserable opening day of the weekend for the Canadian Grand Prix.

Lawson managed just a handful of laps and less than 10 minutes on track in the sole practice session at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve before his Racing Bulls ground to a halt with a hydraulics issue. The problem was so acute that it resulted in the New Zealander sitting out sprint qualifying.

Racing Bulls was also hit with a €30,000 fine – €20,000 suspended for 12 months – following a breach of the technical regulations, notably a failure of the CDS [clutch disengagement system] when Lawson stopped on track.

Lawson now goes into the remainder of the weekend on the back foot given his lack of running.

“It’s frustrating,” said a clearly disheartened Lawson. “Obviously, tomorrow [Saturday] is definitely more important, but this [the problem] really doesn’t help because I’ve done two laps, three laps all day.

“It’s a shame because the car looks really good as well, the pace is looking really good, and I felt good in the first couple of laps.

“Plenty of positives, at least, that we have good speed. We just need to hopefully have a good day [on Saturday], try and learn what we can in the sprints, and then put it all into [grand prix] qualifying.”