Pierre Gasly calls for Alpine engine investigation after strange power loss at Spa

Sam Cooper 30 Jul 2023 10:00 PM

Pierre Gasly looks through his visor. Spa, Belgium. July 2023.

Pierre Gasly has urged Alpine to look into a possible engine problem after he lost power momentarily during the Belgian Grand Prix.

While the Frenchman enjoyed a successful sprint race, his Sunday was a different affair with him finishing outside of the points.

He produced perhaps the overtake of the race on Alex Albon but as often appears to be the case with Alpine at the moment, a good period is soon followed by a bad one.

Pierre Gasly wants investigation into sudden Alpine power loss

Gasly’s quest for a points finish was not helped by a loss of power to his A523.

After the race, the Frenchman urged the Viry-Châtillon team to discover the cause behind the problem.

“We’ve got to check our engine because we were in a decent position but then today we lost some power for some reason,” he told Sky Sports F1.

“[It] just made it impossible even with the DRS to even just get close.

“There are a few things which we need to analyse. I think there was some positives from the weekend with the top three yesterday but we need to find some pure pace.

“A lot went on this weekend. So we’ll use the three, four weeks to sort of build up on the strong result from yesterday and try to come back strong in the second part of the season.”

它was certainly an eventful weekend for Alpine but they did at least end the event with two points scores, a welcome change from their previous back-to-back double DNFs.

Esteban Ocon, who started 14th and rose to eighth, was pleased to bounce back from “circumstances out of our control.”

“感觉好点here in Spa after a few tough weeks where we’ve finished outside the points due to circumstances out of our control,” the 26-year-old said.

“Overall, it was a good recovery drive and a well-executed race from the team today. Eighth place is a very good result after starting from fourteenth on the grid.

“There were some fun overtakes along the way too, especially on Yuki [Tsunoda] and Alex [Albon].

“I think it’s a good way to end a busy weekend for us and a nice way to go into the summer break where we’ll look to rest and recharge before attacking the second part of the season.”