The São Paulo Grand Prix was a surprising success to Alpine and their French drivers as they took P6 in the standings ahead of the Las Vegas GP — and it was an especially masterful drive from Alpine’s Pierre Gasly who qualified P15 yet finished P3, albeit helped by a red flag.
Not only was this Gasly’s first podium since the 2023 Dutch Grand Prix, it was also crucial as it leaped Alpine up three spots to P6 in the constructors’ championship.
The Frenchman continued to pull off an impressive performance as they entered the Las Vegas GP the following week. He managed to stay in the top 10 for all three Free Practice sessions, with his best lap coming during Qualifying.
Gasly qualified a career-best P3 at the Las Vegas GP, clocking a time of a 1:32.664, 0.352s behind polesitter George Russell.
Early Retirement
Despite the positive grid position, he faced an early end to his Saturday in Vegas. With Gasly reporting low power and smoke eventually coming from the back of the car, he was ultimately forced to retire his Alpine on lap 16 of the Las Vegas GP.
A big fight for P8 with Hülkenberg and Tsunoda looked on the cards before his day ended as almost all the big guns had passed Gasly in the first stint, with Tsunoda getting him in the pits as RB delivered a faster stop.
The loss of crucial points and his early retirement left the 2020 Italian GP winner frustrated and disappointed.
“Yeah, I mean, right now it’s just like a tough one to swallow because obviously we had such a high yesterday. Going into the race we were very optimistic that we’ll be able to fight for some good points.”
“I think the first stint was good and as we expected, it was Norris, Max and Lewis overtaking us, but we knew they were quite a few tenths faster than us.
“I think we were in for a good fight for best of the rest with Yuki. We were ahead of him, jumped us in the pits, but then I think we would have taken the fight on track.
“We know there are big points on the table. It was such a good weekend so far that it’s frustrating just to end up having to retire after only a few laps.”
Warning Signs
When asked whether he had any warnings of the failure, he replied that while he isn’t sure what caused it, he definitely knew the exact time he lost power. Initially the team on the pit wall did not see a failure.
Ultimately, it turned out that getting such a powerful slipstream from Tsunoda on the run to turn 14 saw his engine pack in.
“We need to review exactly, but for me it was pretty clear when it happened.
“I just lost all the power, could not upshift, downshift. I need to check if it happened, exactly when and what happened.”
“It needs further investigation. For now I don’t want to go into too much detail because I’m not too sure.
“Just when we know how important these points are, especially in the championship, it’s going to cost us big time today.”
The 5-time podium finisher isn’t too worried about a power unit penalty, citing that he has enough in the pool.
Nonetheless, he is disappointed with the number of DNFs he has had this year, and he never took to the start at Silverstone because of more mechanical gremlins.
“I think I have quite a few PU in my pool so I think I should be fine.
“You never know, but obviously this season I had quite a few problems, there were quite a lot of races which I didn’t take part in.
“It’s just a tough one to have another one starting from P3.”
Confidence moving forward
Despite the weekend’s disappointing end, Gasly is confident moving into the final two races of 2024.
This comes from the car’s improved performance in the recent few races. An example being his qualifying session in Vegas.
He also brought up the team’s newfound confidence and expectations, riding off the high of Brazil, as well as good pace in the dry there, as well as in qualifying in Austin and Mexico.
“I think there are definitely a lot of positives. It’s obviously a lot of disappointment right now. There are obviously a lot of positives. Looking at yesterday, it was definitely a fantastic qualifying.
“There is some performance. We know we have work to do in some areas, but I think we are in a position to take the battle, the new battle that we gave ourselves after Brazil.
“It just feels a bit tough now, going from such a high in Brazil, such a high in qualifying yesterday. It’s a bit of a slap in the face right now.
“Anyway, we have two more chances. I don’t know what’s going to be the outcome after today, but looking at Hülkenberg and Yuki, they look pretty strong.
“We’ll have a tough job ahead of us, but we’ll get ready in Qatar and Abu Dhabi.”
Constructors’ Championship fight
Alpine left Vegas without any points thanks to the early retirement for Gasly, and teammate Esteban Ocon finishing out of points in 17th.
This puts Haas at P6 in the Constructors’ Championship with 50 points as Nico Hülkenberg finished P8, a single point above Alpine.
RB is currently also in the fight. They are placed in P8 with 46 points, 3 points behind Alpine.
The final two races will be important for all three teams as they fight to maintain or improve their positions in the standings.
The Alpine driver is confident they have a good chance in the fight, stating how the cars all had similar pace in Las Vegas.
“I’m confident we’ll take the fight.
“But as I said, they are competitive. We saw Yuki yesterday.
“I think today, looking at the first team, we were at a similar pace. Nico is in there. It’s going to be a matter of executing strong weekends.
“Unfortunately, we don’t score points for qualifying, but for the races.
“We didn’t get it right this weekend. We’ve got to learn from it and make sure we get the last two good weekends in Qatar and Abu Dhabi to finish on a high.”
Thoughts on the Las Vegas Grand Prix
Despite this only being the second Las Vegas Grand Prix, Gasly recounts having fun racing around the street.
He also highlights tyre degradation and graining as the main problem that drivers and teams face in the desert, leading to entertaining racing.
“Honestly, it’s quite fun. I really like racing around these streets. It’s quite high speed.
“There is the challenge with the tyre degradation. I think everybody got caught up a bit with how much degradation we had on that first stint.
“So it definitely throws good challenges to the teams and also us drivers, which makes it exciting.”
