Zandvoort updates to be ’crucial’ in Alpine’s quest to top the midfield battle

Pierre Gasly hopes Alpine can make a step forward with its update package for the Dutch Grand Prix.

At the beginning of the season, Alpine was seemingly the fifth best team on the Formula 1 grid. Moreover, after a successful right of review, Gasly scored a podium finish at the Monaco Grand Prix.

Over the past weekends, however, Racing Bulls and Audi both managed to gain on the French outfit, and scored more points. As a result, Alpine is sixth in the constructors' standings, five points behind the Faenza-based team.

"It's not the reality I want to see, but I mean there's no hiding from it and there's been a couple of races where it's kind of the same story. In Qualifying, 12th, 13th, behind Racing Bulls and Audi," Gasly began to GPblog , among others.

"In the race it's like somehow you think that maybe we're going be there and then I can see them but it's just pure pace, we're not there. Yeah, it also doesn't feel good in the car like it's really, the car is not reacting at all the way I'd like it doesn't allow me to drive the way I need. And there's quite a few things to fix."

Photo: Race Pictures

Photo: Race Pictures

Alpine to introduce updates at Zandvoort

After the summer break, the F1 season will continue with the Dutch Grand Prix. Gasly expects the team's next update package to perform well.

He continued: "I think the aero is very inconsistent and I think it's something which we know and hopefully will be fixed in Zandvoort.

"That's the standard of Formula 1, if you bring upgrades you expect it to definitely get better and my side I'm not doubting that it's going to do what the team expects.

"It's important because Aston Martin improved by two seconds this weekend, they have another engine coming. Racing Bulls improved by seconds since the start of the year Audi as well and we just didn't do many steps. So, yeah, I think it's critical for us if we want to keep the hope for fifth place in the Championship," the Frenchman concluded.

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