BWT Alpine Aims to Move Forward After Frustration in Azerbaijan

BWT Alpine F1 Team finished the Azerbaijan Grand Prix with Pierre Gasly in fourteenth and Esteban Ocon in fifteenth after a weekend of frustration and disappointment. The race itself featured little action or opportunities to make progress which left the team turning to a bold strategy for both drivers to get ahead.

Gasly’s fourteenth place came from a two-stop Medium-Hard-Hard strategy which allowed him to make a pair of very neat overtakes on Valtteri Bottas and Logan Sargeant into Turn 1. Reflecting on the race he said “This is a weekend all of us are keen to quickly move on from as it’s been a very frustrating one for all of us at the team… In terms of my race, we tried something different on strategy and hoped for some fortune, but in the end, we couldn’t do much more. I made a couple of moves, that’s always satisfying, but it’s much more rewarding when those overtakes are for points. I’m looking forward to racing in Miami next weekend.”

Ocon started from the Pit Lane and remained on the track until the penultimate lap when he pitted for new Soft tyres on his mandatory pit-stop. In the sole lap he retained and finished in fifteenth. He added “We gave it everything we could today, going for the Hail Mary strategy in the hope for a late Safety Car or incident, but things did not go our way. We can be proud with our efforts, pushing all the way to the end and extracting the most from the Hard tyres…We were not where we want to be in terms of performance this weekend. And, after a weekend of learning, we have a chance to review and comeback stronger in Miami. I know we will do just that.”

The team now looks ahead to the Miami Grand Prix this coming weekend (5-7^th May).