Alpine admits mistake in qualifying

Alpine drivers Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly were the only ones left in the pits at the end of the first part of qualifying for the Hungarian Grand Prix, when the track started to dry out. As a result, all the opponents were able to improve and Esteban and Pierre completed the score sheet. The team admitted that they had made a mistake.

Esteban Ocon (19th): “It is a shame that qualifying ended early for us. It is clear that we made a mistake by deciding not to go out on track at a time when the condition of the asphalt and the lap times had improved significantly.

I was tenth for the restart of the session after the red flags, and we showed good pace in the changing conditions, but then misjudged how the track conditions would change.

Now it is easy to say what was done wrong, but we win and lose as a team and today we did not do the right thing. The most important thing is to learn and make the right decisions in the future.”

Pierre Gasly (20th): “Today we couldn’t do everything right. In the first session, with changing weather conditions, the result depends less on the car and more on entering the track at the right time.

We got it completely wrong today and the mistake resulted in a missed opportunity to get a better result. In these circumstances, when the track conditions change from wet to dry, there are usually extra opportunities and we had to take advantage of that. It’s simple: we should have done better.

Tomorrow will be a difficult race after starting from last position, but we will do our best and see what results we can achieve.”