Pierre Gasly says “I personally thought that we would have a bit more pace” after he drove to P9 in the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.
The Alpine driver finished behind his team mate Esteban Ocon and secured his second consecutive points finish of the year.
Gasly said post-race: “I personally thought that we would have a bit more pace to join the fight ahead of us and unfortunately we finish where we are at the moment eighth and ninth and pretty much always where we are I think we were 10 seconds behind the Ferraris.
“Mercedes was definitely faster than we thought and it’s just what we’ve got at the moment and we need to analyse what we can do better.
“On the positive it’s the second race with the team, second time in the points and things were slightly more consistent throughout the weekend but still there’s stuff to work on.
“Generally I felt very good on Saturday morning, things got a bit more tricky in qualifying and again today (I) struggled with the same thing as yesterday but we’ll review everything but overall it’s only the second race so it’s all about building up and learning and putting things together as fast as possible.”
The Frenchman made slight contact with McLaren’s Oscar Piastri on the opening lap, the touch was enough to damage Piastri’s car.
Gasly challenged Lewis Hamilton at the start but failed to pass the 38-year-old before settling into the race.
The Alpine driver said: “I can’t remember if I got him (Oscar Piastri) straight out of the box or into Turn 1 but we were side by side and there was light contact out of Turn 2, unfortunately he picked up damage from it.
“From inside the car it was so light I was surprised that he even picked up damage from it but I had to go for it and also at the restart.
“That was the only time where I raced pretty much the whole race after (I was) a bit in no mans land. I got close to Lewis at the start but I could not quite pass him and that was about it.”
The Enstone-based team sit fifth in the Constructors Championship after two races, Gasly explained the outfit have a plan as to where the A523 can become a quicker car.
“We sort of have our ideas on where we need to improve, it’s still early to make very strong conclusions on what and why but generally we know what to improve.
“It was good to get close (to Esteban) then afterwards we stayed two seconds from each other for the majority of the race.
“Unfortunately that was the only real race for us because we were 10 seconds behind the guys ahead and 10 seconds ahead of the guys behind us but I think it just shows that it’s pretty much where we are and as I say it’s the second race with the team so its good to build from another strong race after Bahrain and we’ll work to get stronger race after race.”
