The 28-year-old Briton struggled to make ground in the season-opener in what turned out to be something of a processional affair at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez circuit.
This in part was due to energy management not being as critical as on other circuits and meant Dennis’s starting position of 14th put him on the backfoot at the beginning of his title defence.
“The front is always a bit easier to overtake because it’s a lot more spread out and everyone is a little bit more cautious but when you’re in the pack and there’s 10 cars together you can’t really do too much,” Dennis told Autosport.
“Bit difficult but I think we made the best of a bad situation from qualifying. I think P5 was there for the taking if we got the strategy right but ultimately, we didn’t.”
Issues with braking were the primary reason for Dennis’s struggles in qualifying as he finished seventh in his group after running wide at the Turn 5 hairpin on his final run.
But despite the error, he was only 0.235s off the fastest time and believes his true pace was masked in the race because of how difficult it was to overtake.
“Just not enough confidence under braking was our biggest issue,” said Dennis.
Source: Autosport