Alpine reveals car issues which preceded bizarre FP1 stoppage

Alpine Team Principal Otmar Szafnauer explained the technical issues which brought an end to Pierre Gasly's Formula 1 free practice one session.

The opening 60-minute session was red-flagged early on when Gasly stopped his Alpine car just before Turn 8, which triggered a red flag period.

Despite the usual quick recovery from the marshals, the track remained under red flag conditions when an issue with the CCTV infrastructure was discovered, and was unable to be rectified in time for any more running.

Gasly initially radioed his team to suggest that a driveshaft issue was the culprit for his stoppage, but this was denied by Szafnauer after FP1.

"As we always do, we run the spare steering wheels on both cars and the reason we run them is to make sure that they're functioning because the rest of the weekend we don't run them unless they're needed as a spare," the Alpine team boss told media, including RacingNews365.com.

"And lo and behold, we had an electronics issue within the steering wheel on Pierre’s car.

"Once we got it back and put the non-spare wheel on, it was all okay, so we've got to understand what bit of the electronics failed within the steering wheel."

With Alpine looking to achieve a similarly-impressive qualifying performance as their 2022 efforts, there were issues for the second car belonging to Esteban Ocon, who stopped in FP2.

Speaking at the end of Friday's running, Szafnauer also confirmed a loss of water pressure on Ocon's car, compounding a difficult day for the Enstone-based team.

"Unfortunately, Esteban’s session stopped early in free practice two as a result of losing water pressure on his car; we will take the time to investigate the cause of this issue.

"It means our running was limited and we must target a much smoother free practice three to put ourselves in the best possible position ahead of qualifying.

"The weather looks mixed with a high chance of rain throughout the day, so we’ll remain ready for all possibilities.”