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Pierre Gasly believes Alpine have the pace to fight Mercedes based on data from the Bahrain weekend.
However, the Frenchman felt it all depends on where Mercedes improve but they do aim to defeat the former world champions.
Asked by Sportskeeda where Alpine stack up realistically based on the data from Bahrain where they almost matched Mercedes, Pierre Gasly said:
“You can either be a dreamer or a believer. I do think we would have been in the fight, whether it’s based on just information we have and the one you have as well, what I’m quite optimistic about is we have shown definitely some speed."
"And if we manage to make or improve the package we have and suit it bit more to my liking, obviously it depends on what they (Mercedes) bring to the table, I think we could be in that fight and that’s what we are aiming obviously.”
In Bahrain, Pierre Gasly was almost matching Mercedes’ long run pace and race simulations on the same tire. Answering Sportskeeda's question ahead of the Jeddah GP, the Frenchman replied that he was optimistic they could fight the Mercedes drivers. But most of it depended on how they improvised their own package and how Mercedes continued to develop their package.
Overall, the former AlphaTauri driver felt their car had shown promising pace and he was up for a good fight with the Mercedes.
Pierre Gasly believes it will take some more races to determine Alpine's position in the pecking order
Evaluating the performances of his rivals at the Bahrain GP, Pierre Gasly noted that the gap between Fernando Alonso and George Russell was not much. The Spaniard finished the race in third on the podium while the Briton was seventh.
The Alpine driver explained to Sportskeeda that the long straights of the Jeddah Corniche circuit make it a power sensitive one, and felt it would be interesting how the weekend unfolds at this circuit. Hoping for their own upgrades to work in their favor, the Frenchman hopes to be a strong contender in the midfield mix or even closer to the front runners.
Outlining the expectations from his car and its potential in his reply to Sportskeeda, Pierre Gasly said:
“If you look like from Fernando to George, nor a massive, there is not like a world between them. So I think first of all it would be very interesting to see at a very different track in Jeddah, it’s a lot more high speed, a lot more sort of engine power related with all these long straights, how we compare to these guys, better for us or not."
"Melbourne is going to be another one, so after five races we’ll have a better idea and understanding where we at. And then yeah we’ve got a couple of upgrades coming and hopefully that can play in our favour. And get us in the mix.”
In his maiden outing with the French team, Pierre Gasly finished ninth while his teammate Esteban Ocon suffered a sleuth of penalties throughout the race. The former Red Bull driver has been able to match his fellow Frenchman since the first weekend of the season itself and has had a smooth transition from AlphaTauri to Alpine.
