Alpine on the back foot for first day at Monza
Despite a completely flat spoiler for top speed, Alpine isn't there at all at the moment. In Italy, the French carmaker was in last place on the first day of testing.
We were thinking of a resurgence. Finally, maybe not so much. At Monza, Alpine is lagging behind. A situation that contrasts well with Pierre Gasly’s result in Zandvoort. The Frenchman had placed his car in Q3 and finished in the points zone.
If the rest of the Italian weekend is similar to Friday’s session, it should be difficult to see an Alpine in the Top 10 regularly. The best position remains the 14th place of Pierre Gasly during the first free practice session. Otherwise, the French cars are around the 18th place.
(We did not have the best start to the weekend so far and we simply did not have the pace today, so we will have to work hard to find improvements), announces Esteban Ocon. (We are trying a lot of different things right now to find more performance, but it seems that we are still struggling a lot. We had a good run today and gathered useful data, so we will continue to work hard. The whole team is working so that we can find more performance. But it could be another tough weekend for us on this track. We keep pushing and with the track changes, we hope to have opportunities tomorrow. We need to make sure we are ready to seize all opportunities.)
Pierre Gasly is a bit more positive than his garage neighbour. The number 10 driver indicates that his best time is not representative of his abilities. He was not able to make the most of the soft tires as he wanted due to traffic and the red flag caused by Kevin Magnussen.
« I am confident in our ability to improve the car and make it more efficient. The pack is extremely tight and we will have to be perfect », Pierre Gasly announces, aiming for a spot in Q2. But to achieve this, he will have to complete a perfect lap.
