Gasly reveals how "aggressive aerodynamic package" helped Alpine in Las Vegas qualifying
After his sensational podium finish in Brazil, Pierre Gasly displayed a surprise performance in the qualifying session at the Las Vegas Grand prix to secure third place on the grid for tomorrow's race.
Alpine’s late season improvements continued, with Pierre Gasly making it out of Q2. In fact, the Frenchman did not only secure a spot inside the top ten, but he grabbed a season’s best third, out-qualifying a Ferrari, a Red Bull, both McLarens and a Mercedes.
The result sees Gasly start quite a few places ahead of his midfield rivals, too, on a weekend where Alpine have every chance of extending their advantage in the fight for sixth in the constructors’.
Asked how satisfying this moment is for Alpine, the Frenchman said: "It's absolutely incredible, you know, as a team. Exactly as you mentioned, we started Bahrain on the last row with both cars, and all of a sudden, the last few weeks have been quite a change
"I'm really happy and pleased with the work the team has been doing in a season where everything looked impossible, just to still stick together and put some more performance in that car.
"Going into qualifying today, I must admit we never thought we'll be in a position to actually you know get in that top three, but yeah, I managed to have a very special lap at the right time on that last set in Q3 and uh yeah it's a it's a very nice surprise."
Alpine introduced a raft of upgrades back in Austin at the United States Grand Prix. Speaking of the technical changes, Gasly said that the Enstone-based outfit has gone very aggressive with its choice of aerodynamic package to boost its chances.
"I mean, we went with a pretty aggressive package in terms of downforce, so we are running very little downforce around this track. We try to maximise the straight lines, we obviously make our lives slightly harder in the corners.
"But yeah, I think it's a challenging track. It's very cold conditions. It's quite an outlier in the season. But I had a nice feeling in the car since P1. P2 went well. P3 went well. And then in that Q3, we managed to make it work with only one set of new tyres as well.
"So there was definitely some good pace. And yeah, for now, I'm very pleased. Obviously, it's only qualifying, but I think it's probably the first time I qualify in the top three. And it feels like it was a special one.
