"Barbecue at the back of the car" - Pierre Gasly speaks about his disappointing outing at the 2022 F1 Bahrain GP

Pierre Gasly described his disappointing experience during the season opener in Bahrain. The Frenchman's AlphaTauri randomly went into flames, leading to early retirement for the 25-year-old.

The first race of the season was an eye-opener for Red Bull-powered cars, with three out of four Red Bull Powertrains cars having developed a major problem over the course of the race. Reigning world champion Max Verstappen and teammate Sergio Perez both developed issues with their cars, leading to a much-dreaded double DNF for the team.

Pierre Gasly told media about his disappointing outing in Bahrain, saying:

“Well, the whole car just switched off outside of turn 1 and then after it started to smell not too good inside the car. It was pretty much a barbecue at the end of the car. Yeah, not the start we hoped for. It is a shame because until then the race was amazing. Had a really good start and managed to pass Fernando [Alonso] and also Kevin [Magnussen] when I had the chance - running in P8. We lost quite a lot of points but there are still quite a lot of positives to take from today.”

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Pierre Gasly still optimistic for the future despite major failure for Red Bull powered cars in Bahrain

Despite the harrowing outing in Sakhir, Pierre Gasly is optimistic about AlphaTauri's future in 2022. The driver managed to qualify in tenth place while his teammate and 2021 rookie Yuki Tsunoda managed to place 16th on the grid.

Answering a follow-up question post-race, the Frenchman claimed he had good pace leading up to the disaster. The 25-year-old was running in P8 before developing a fault in his car. Pierre Gasly continued, saying:

“It is looking pretty good for the next few races. Obviously we still need to understand what has happened. I saw that Max and Checo had problems so not a great day for Honda. But I am sure we will find solutions. As you said, the pace was great. Had some good battles and it felt good to be back racing again.”

Yuki Tsunoda was the only Red Bull-powered driver who did not suffer any noticeable issues throughout the season opener in Bahrain. The Japanese driver showed great pace as he finished in P8 despite starting 16th on the grid.

All eyes are now on Red Bull, with there being no news of what truly went wrong for their cars in Bahrain. Fans are of the hope that the Austrian giants can fix their reliability issues before the next race as F1 goes to Jeddah for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix very shortly.