Last weekend Alpine proved to be “back on track”, after the disappointments of the Australian Grand Prix and the very bad performance on the Baku circuit, in Azerbaijan. In Melbourne, Gasly and Ocon had finished the race in thirteenth and fourteenth positions because of their accident on the final standing restart, and on the Azerbaijani circuit they had arrived at the checkered flag fourteenth and fifteenth.
In Miami, the French team demonstrated an excellent performance both in qualifying and in the race, raising the standards and earning 6 points, thanks to Pierre Gasly’s eighth place and Esteban Ocon’s ninth place.
“We tried to do the best we could during our race,” Gasly told the media after the race.
“I had a great start, managed to pass [Magnussen] for P4, and tried to keep up the pace with Sainz and Alonso in front of me. Unfortunately, they were just faster than us today, so I tried to do the best we could.
Gasly dropped back to 6th after Verstappen and Russell passed him in quick succession. Leclerc and Hamilton would also get him in the closing laps as he saw the chequered flag in P8.
He explained what he had to do during the race to manage the fuel and why he lost those two positions in the end:
“In the second stint, I was running in P6. Then with 15 laps to go, I needed to do a lot of fuel-saving, which was a little annoying when you know that you have a Ferrari and a Mercedes behind catching and closing on you,” the Frenchman added.
“I wanted to give everything we could, but at the same time we needed to save fuel, and we saw Charles catching us slowly lap by lap, and unfortunately with four laps to go, he managed to pass.
“So on one side, I’m a bit gutted to not get that P6.
“On the other side, if we fight one Ferrari and one Mercedes so close to the chequered flag, it really shows we made a big step forward this weekend.
“So we’ve got to look at the positive things, double points finish for the team and hopefully we can build up from there and close the gap with the four teams ahead of us,” he stated.
Despite the very strong pace in Melbourne, Gasly thinks this is Alpine’s best weekend to date in 2023. In terms of points, it equals their most successful event to date. They also scored six points in Jeddah.
“I think it was our best weekend of the year, qualifying 5th and finishing 8th. I think it was a more traditional weekend,” stated Gasly.
“But now we need to undestand what’s happened in Baku and why we lacked so much performance, because this weekend was a lot better.
“We’ve got to figure out this package and to try and get more consistency over the next few weekends.”
