The outlook for Alpine didn't look all that good after last week's pre-season test, and today's performance in qualifying for the Bahrain GP has confirmed that the team is not getting the start to the season it had been hoping for.
Both Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly failed to make the cut at the end of the first round today, and they were the slowest cars when Q1 came to an end meaning they will be on the back row of the grid tomorrow.
Ocon tried to be encouraging over the team radio, telling the team that they needed to keep pushing. But speaking to the media in the paddock, he admitted that things weren't looking good.
“I don’t think it was a surprise, unfortunately," he conceded. "Looking at testing, we could start to have clues. We were not sure, but the reality is today, that’s where we are."
“But as I said in my radio message, I have faith in that team. That team, some years ago, were champions," he pointed out, referring to 2005 and 2005 when the team won consecutive titles as Renault with Fernando Alonso.
“We need to stay all united, all motivated and it’s important that we go in the same line and we keep the chin up," he continued. "We need to be progressing, otherwise it’s going to be a long year.”
Ocon hopes that tomorrow's race will bring a glimmer of hope when it comes to the car's race pace.
“It’s going to be a good test to see where we are in comparison to single-lap pace," he said. "Looking at testing, I think we should be a little closer to the others so I look forward to seeing what we can achieve”.
For his part, Gasly said that his final out-lap had been compromised, which is why he hadn't been able to improve his time and get out of the drop zone in time.
"We didn’t do the best job we could today; we were the last cars out on track on that last run and ran out of time on the out-lap, and I ended up racing with Checo," he said, referring to Red Bull's Sergio Perez.
“The time was running out and it was a very poor out-lap, so that last run was quite compromised," he argued.
"[Otherwise] I feel we would have had a shot at Q2, which in the big picture is still not great, but better than the position we’re in right now.
"We knew it would not be an easy start to the season and, of course, it’s always a tough one to take when you exit in Q1," he said. “We knew it was going to be tough. We saw it coming, so not a surprise.
“We know we have a lot of work ahead of us,” he added. "We know we’re not in the position we want to be. It’s a new car, it’s not performing the way we would like.
"The whole team is working really hard to improve this current situation, but we also know that we’ll have to be patient and we’ll have to wait for these upgrades," Gasly admitted.
“We’ve been experimenting quite a lot this weekend," he insisted. "There is no magic button, but I’m confident the team will find a way to bring more performance over the next few weeks.
"Most importantly, we’re sticking together as a team. For tomorrow, a lot can always happen on race day. We will try and maximise everything we have in our hands and get the best from it. We’ll keep pushing all the way.”
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