The circuit of the first success
Five years after the first and only victory achieved by Alpine at the Hungarian GP with Esteban Ocon, the French team will return to the Hungaroring this weekend to try and finish the first half of the championship on a high note. The Hungarian weekend will be the last before the summer break, and it will take place on a track with a completely different layout from Spa-Francorchamps, where the team scored only one point with Franco Colapinto.
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Extending the lead over Racing Bulls
In this regard, both the Argentine driver and Pierre Gasly will not only have the task of bringing home the best possible result, but also of distancing Racing Bulls from the Constructors’ standings, which has caught up with Alpine in 5th place after excellent performances in recent races: “I was very happy to have scored a point on Sunday at Spa after a long, hard-fought race with Pierre and Lawson that provided a lot of action – commented Colapinto – in Belgium we seemed a bit stronger than our opponents and we will try to maintain this level in Budapest this weekend, even though the circuit represents a completely different challenge. It’s a track where I’ve achieved good results in my junior career and I can’t wait to go back and experience it with this year’s cars. Energy management will be more normal compared to the last two events, with so many corners, so I hope we can have a lot of fun with the lighter cars we have this year. We will give our best throughout the weekend to bring home a good result and score more points before the summer break.” The Argentine, however, will not take part in all sessions of the weekend: Alpine has in fact announced its reserve driver Paul Aron for FP1, who had already taken part in two official sessions (Barcelona and Austria), albeit with Audi.
Coming off a not particularly brilliant Belgian GP, the last pre-summer commitment could be an opportunity for Gasly to enjoy the holidays with less stress: “After a few days of rest after Spa, I am ready to tackle the Hungaroring this weekend, with the aim of going into the break with a positive attitude. In recent weeks, the situation has become more difficult, with some of our rivals making life more complicated for us, both in qualifying and in the race, regarding the top positions. We know what we need to do to improve, but we must accept that it is not an immediate solution. There are some things we know we can improve, so we will focus on that this weekend: taking care of some small details and trying to maximize the final result. The Hungaroring represents a very different challenge compared to Spa or Silverstone, the last two races we have competed in. It is a much more technical circuit, with different conditions, and it will be interesting to see how it performs with this generation of cars. I was disappointed not to have scored points at Spa, so I go to Budapest hungry and motivated to achieve a good team result.”
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