It was a busy opening day of running in Bahrain for Pierre Gasly, but Alpine's new charger declared himself "satisfied" with the results of his workload.
Gasly completed FP2 with the seventh fastest lap, but just 0.568s behind Fernando Alonso who topped the remarkably tight session for Aston Martin.
"It feels great to be back in competitive action and feeling the demands of a Friday Practice day," commented the Frenchman at the end of the day.
"In testing there’s obviously a bit more time to learn about the car and make changes, but today was a reminder of how fast paced everything is and how concise and accurate you have to be during the sessions.
"I’m satisfied with how we’ve worked today. We ran through a busy programme, and we’ve built up a good picture on car set-up in the conditions we expect to see for the rest of the weekend.
"I’d say Free Practice 2 was much more comfortable. The car felt good and there’s more to come from us this weekend. I’m excited for Qualifying tomorrow."
With just 0.975s separating the top 13 cars in Friday's second free practice, all bets are off on predicting the pecking order in F1's midfield this weekend.
But Esteban Ocon, who clocked in just outside the top ten in FP2, noted Alpine's progress since last week's pre-season test.
"We saw today that the car has gained performance since the test and we have a clearer picture of where there are improvements to be made," he said.
"Things are going in the right direction and we’ll be discussing at length tonight how we can get ready to have a good first qualifying of the season.
"There’s more to come from us and I’m feeling ready."
©Alpine
Alpine chief technical officer Pat Fry agreed that there was more to come from the Enstone squad's A523 contender.
"We’ve spent a lot of time working through our learnings from last week and identifying a good direction to follow on car set-up, which will serve us well for tomorrow and Sunday," commented Fry.
"Free Practice 1 was challenging in the hot conditions but I’m pleased with the improvements we made for Free Practice 2 where track and ambient temperatures were significantly cooler.
"Still, there’s more hard work ahead of us and there’s definitely more to come.
"Our upgrades worked in line with our expectations, so credit to the entire team for their tireless work over the past couple of weeks in preparation for the first race."
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