Pierre Gasly ‘relieved’ as late Safety Car in Spain leads to points as Franco Colapinto identifies key area to improve

Pierre Gasly finished eighth in Spain, to add some more vital points to Alpine’s tally in what is shaping up to be an incredibly tight fight in the Teams’ Championship. But while there was relief for the Frenchman, Franco Colapinto wasn’t so lucky as he rued a “tough race” in Barcelona.

With Gasly starting in the top 10, Alpine had high hopes of a good Sunday – but they did have to work hard to get those points with varying strategies in play plus a late Safety Car. Gasly was on the medium compound when the Safety Car appeared, Alpine making the right call to quickly swap him to soft tyres.

That meant he had enough rubber to fend off any attacks from behind, just running out of time to take the fight to Isack Hadjar ahead. He came home ninth, inheriting eighth thanks to a time penalty for Max Verstappen.

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“It was a more challenging Sunday for us but, all in all, it is a good outcome for us to score points today,” Gasly said. “It has been a challenging start to the season, quite a difficult triple header in recent weeks for us and we knew, as a team, after Monaco, we needed to bounce back here in Barcelona with some points.