Pierre Gasly has stated that the Italian Grand Prix was “super painful” for Alpine as it failed to challenge for points on a poor weekend. Alpine was expected to struggle at the race weekend, due to its strengths lying at high downforce circuits and not the high-speed, low downforce Monza. Earlier this year, Esteban Ocon secured a podium finish at Monaco, while just one week before Monza, Gasly claimed third at the Dutch Grand Prix. But both Alpine drivers were eliminated in Q1 during qualifying and couldn’t progress up the field throughout the race, with Gasly taking the chequered flag in 15th place. "It’s been super painful," the Frenchman told media including RacingNews365. "We have such a lack of competitiveness compared to our rivals and we knew straight away from the start of the season, we knew that it would be a painful [race]. "It was clearly very difficult out there and we saw it [during qualfiying]. "We knew there would not be any magic overnight, but it's just pretty painful from inside the cockpit."
Gasly's strategy gamble
Gasly was the first driver in the field to pit during the race, swapping his Medium tyres for the Hard compound. Although the strategy decision didn’t pay off, Gasly stated that Alpine’s lack of pace forced it to undertake a different direction during the race. "We thought we would try something different on both cars and if the Safety Car came at any moment then Esteban would benefit from it or I would benefit from it at a later point," he said. "But, when you're lacking so much performance like that, you just got to gamble. "Unfortunately there is no secret. When you're competitive, it always ends up very well, when you’re not competitive, it’s way harder."
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