Unfortunate Double Retirement in Hungary For BWT Alpine F1 Team​​

The BWT Alpine F1 Team endured a disappointing race day in Hungary at the weekend (23^rd July) after an unavoidable Turn 1 collision on the opening lap of the race.

Both drivers had a strong start to the race with Gasly starting in P15 and Ocon starting in P12. Unfortunately Alfa Romeo’s Guanyu Zhou clipped the Alpha Tauri of Daniel Riccardio under braking who then hit Ocon. He was shunted, with a brief stint where the car was airborne, and then made contact with Gasly.

Both cars were seriously damaged in the collision which caused Gasly to retire at the end of the first lap and Ocon at the end of the second.

Reflecting on the weekend, Ocon said “There is not much to say from today. It’s a very frustrating end to the weekend being involved in a racing incident with a few cars at Turn 1 on the first lap. There was not much we could do and the result was both cars had to retire with significant damage. Fortunately, I’m OK. Right now our focus is on regrouping and coming back stronger as we have another race next weekend in Belgium.”

Gasly added, “It’s extremely frustrating for the entire team to have a double retirement, especially in such circumstances so early into the race. I was the unfortunate victim of a crash between a handful of cars and I just had nowhere to go and no chance of avoiding the incident. It’s disappointing after making a good start off the line where I gained a couple of positions. As a team, we have to move on quickly and we have an immediate opportunity in Spa next weekend to make sure we enter the summer break with points.”

The team now looks ahead to the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa-Francorchamps this weekend (28^th-30^th July) to take some more points before the summer break.