Gasly hails “fantastic weekend” as AlphaTauri draws level with Alpine

Gasly finished comfortably ahead of the two Ferraris to finish fourth at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez.

It was a lonely race for the AlphaTauri driver, finishing over 17 seconds ahead of Charles Leclerc in fifth. 

“I’m extremely happy, yes. It’s been a fantastic weekend – fifth in quali and fourth in the race,” Gasly said. 

“Everything was under control with Charles [Leclerc] behind and I could pull away nicely. I managed the whole race, so no, just a fantastic day.”

Mexico was an important race for Gasly having not scored in three of the previous four races before the Mexico City GP.

“Yes exactly. Especially in the last four races… we had two DNFs even though the pace was there. But this weekend, the car was there, we delivered yesterday in quali, we delivered today in the race and finishing [ahead of] the two Ferraris always feels nice.”

The result means AlphaTauri sits level on points with Alpine in the race for fifth in the constructors’ championship - the French outfit is ahead on countback thanks to Esteban Ocon’s win at the Hungaroring.

Brazil is next up in F1 - the scene of Pierre Gasly’s maiden podium for Toro Rosso back in 2019. 

“We’re equal on points with Alpine now,” he added. “So it’s my personal target to give that to Franz so I can have a nice Christmas gift at the end of the year! 

So we’ll keep pushing for that and looking at our work as a team. I think we have our chances and we’ll fight until the end.”