The top 10 F1 drivers of the 2020 season: 6 - PIERRE GASLY

After his knock backs and Red Bull rejection in 2019, Pierre Gasly hit back with remarkable resilience as he carved out the best season of his F1 career to date with AlphaTauri. 

Naturally, his dream maiden F1 victory at Monza will be remembered as the standout moment of 2020. Aided by a large slice of good fortune and luck, Gasly found himself in the unlikely position of leading the Italian Grand Prix and resisted intense late pressure to fend off McLaren’s Carlos Sainz to take his first win in the sport and deliver one of F1’s greatest feel good moments of the year.

But Monza was just the highlight of a number of accomplished drives Gasly produced across the season. Following on from his strong end to 2019, the Frenchman continued to build on his performances and took important momentum into an unprecedented 2020 campaign.

Gasly was back to his best at AlphaTauri as he worked to successfully rebuild his reputation following his demotion from Red Bull that left his career up in the air in a year in which he had also suffered personal tragedy after losing his best friend Anthoine Hubert.

Gasly claimed 10 points finishes across the 17-round campaign to earn himself a spot inside the top-10 in the drivers’ championship, with particularly outstanding drives coming at Spa, Portugal and Bahrain.

He also made it into Q3 on eight occasions as he comprehensively outperformed teammate Daniil Kvyat in both qualifying and the races, beating the Russian 12-2 in the Saturday head-to-heads and managing 63 points compared to Kvyat’s 26.

Now mentally stronger than ever having recovered from his lowest of lows, Gasly was reliable and consistently fast as he not only secured his future in F1 and proved his qualities beyond doubt, but also asserted himself as a team leader at AlphaTauri.