Pierre Gasly was left puzzled by instructions from his Alpine team late in the Japanese Grand Prix that he described as a “complete joke.”
Alpine ordered Gasly to give up ninth place to teammate Esteban Ocon on the final lap as he hadn’t managed to catch and pass Fernando Alonso ahead for eighth in the final stint. However, with the drivers running two different strategies, Gasly was angry when the request was made as his team radio at the time shows:
Engineer: “OK mate, we’ve got Esteban 2.4 (seconds) behind, instruction from the pit wall coming, er, can we swap back around?”
Gasly: “Wait, what the f***, you kidding me?! Why you saying like… I was faster, I’m on fresher rubber if he would not have let me pass I’d have overtaken him anyway.”
Engineer: “Yeah, we’ll discuss it in the office, let’s please swap around.”
Gasly: “Are you serious? You’re being serious? I started in front, I was in front the whole race, you let him undercut me.”
Engineer: “Mate, I’m not joking, those instructions come from the pit wall. Next time around, T16 please.”
Gasly: “You confirm you want to swap?”
Engineer: “Affirm mate, affirm please.”
Gasly: “Yeah, thank you. Complete joke.”
“It wasn’t discussed before the race,” Gasly explained afterwards. “I was told that Esteban decided to undercut me with the strategy, to favor him — it would obviously undercut me, who was the leading car, and they would let me pass so we don’t lose time.
“It was never said that we’d need to invert the positions again, because I started ahead and I was always in front. As a team, 10th and ninth or ninth and 10th is the same. But it was definitely not something I expected and not something I really understand as well, because I was the leading car. We’ll talk, yeah.
“I think we did a good strategy. As a team, we did the best job we could with both cars. I don’t understand the team’s decision but I respected it. I let Esteban past. But in the end, it’s three points for the team, and that’s what we have to look at.”
Gasly said it was clear that the way the two strategies would play out meant positions would need to change on track, but insists it wasn’t planned that he would be asked to move aside.