"Hopefully it can keep going that way": Esteban Ocon reflects on working with new Alpine teammate Pierre Gasly

Esteban Ocon believes that team duties are being shared equally between him and Pierre Gasly after Fernando Alonso’s departure from Alpine.

At a press conference ahead of the Saudi Arabian GP, the Frenchman was asked by Sportskeeda if he was leading the team after Alonso’s departure. Esteban Ocon responded:

“Well, I'm obviously focusing on myself and you know, the job I have to do with the team, in a way that we have to develop this car, understand the issues that we have, and I'm very focused on doing that. So I'm doing you know, the same job that I was doing last year, but obviously, yes, we are together with Pierre on most of the things that we do. And at the moment, it is going really well. And we hope we can keep working the way we are at the moment. There are some interesting topics when we are in meetings and we are discovering things every time that we that we are together at the factory and on track. So, yeah, it's quite interesting, so hopefully it can keep going that way.”

Given the similarity in age between the Normandy-born drivers, the atmosphere at the French team is vastly different from what it has been in the past. Pierre Gasly also spoke to Sportskeeda, disclosing that the transition to his new team has been rather seamless.

Given the former AlphaTauri driver's experience at Red Bull and its sister team, it's no surprise that he has been able to work well with his new teammate.

It certainly seems like a long time since Esteban Ocon complained about having to do all the development work and marketing duties when Alonso was around.

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Esteban Ocon targeting strong qualifying session at Saudi Arabian GP

Despite a disappointing start to the season, Esteban Ocon is looking forward to qualifying at the Saudi Arabian GP.

Speaking ahead of the weekend in Jeddah, the French driver said:

“It's definitely what we are targeting. And we've done that in Bahrain. It’s definitely not our best circuit as a whole. Last year was a pretty similar thing. We got P9 in Qualifying – but we qualified fifth here. And we've been recently very strong out on this track. And it's a track that I've been enjoying racing at. So, hopefully we can repeat the same, be competitive and have a good race weekend.”

Alpine showed some promising signs in Bahrain, with Gasly finishing ninth after starting 20th on the grid.

Despite a glitchy start to the season, the French outfit have shown decent pace and Gasly believes they can match Mercedes and Aston Martin.

Given the eventful races the Saudi Arabian track has produced in the past, a clean qualifying session and race are going to be key to achieving a good result.