Alpine had a mixed day this Sunday (19) at the Belgian Grand Prix of Formula 1. While Franco Colapinto celebrated the point earned, Pierre Gasly regretted just missing out on the top 10.
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The Frenchman started from tenth position, but after a difficult start at Spa-Francorchamps, he crossed the finish line only in 11th place, losing one position compared to the start.
“It was a frustrating race for me, where we finished just outside the points zone. I had a difficult start; for some reason, I wasn’t fast enough in the initial phase and lost some positions on the first lap. After that, we had to try to recover ground amid the points battle involving several teams and cars. We tried the undercut to get past Racing Bulls, but we made a relatively slow pit stop; this caused my out-lap from the pits to be in the middle of traffic, which hurt our chances of success with that strategy,” he said.
“In my view, the race result could have been different if we had track position and were ahead of Racing Bulls at that moment; so, there are some points to analyze and for me to better understand. After that, lap after lap, there were many energy management tactics and overtakes on the Kemmel Straight. Today things didn’t go my way, but the overall picture is that we don’t have enough speed. Gabriel [Bortoleto] and Arvid [Lindblad] were far ahead — a trend observed in recent weeks that we need to reverse as soon as possible. I will have a few days to rest before fully focusing on Budapest, the last race before the summer break,” he added.
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Meanwhile, the Argentine went the other way and after starting 11th, finished tenth, scoring a point. “I’m happy to have earned a point this afternoon in Belgium, finishing in 10th place. It was a long and busy race, but also very fun to drive, with lots of action. We had a good race; a good start allowed us to gain positions, putting us up front and in a position to score points,” he said.
“I really liked the double overtake that secured 10th place! That was possible thanks to good acceleration and the slipstream; then, I just had to try to pass Liam [Lawson] on the inside and get past Pierre to complete the move. Overall, we know where our fight is and where we lack pace. Without a doubt, we were a bit stronger here than on some recent tracks. We will make more progress soon, but for now, I’m satisfied that we extracted the maximum possible today. The next stage is Budapest, a circuit very different from this one,” he concluded.
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