Gasly has “no answers” for “shocking” lack of pace in F1’s Qatar GP

Gasly started the race at the Losail International Circuit from the front row of the grid, moving up two places on the grid from fourth due to grid penalties for Max Verstappen and Valtteri Bottas.

The AlphaTauri driver lost out to Alpine’s Fernando Alonso on the opening lap before losing positions to the Red Bulls and Lando Norris during the early phase of the race.

The team opted for a two-stop strategy, but despite the early stop, Gasly couldn’t undercut his one-stopping rivals - Alonso, Norris - meaning his two-stop was destined to be unsuccessful.

Gasly ultimately finished a disappointing 11th, while teammate Yuki Tsunoda - who also started inside the top 10 - finished 13th. 

Speaking after the race, Gasly said: “It was very frustrating. Our pace was shocking basically, we don’t really have the answer, we tried to stick with Fernando with the first few laps, I could barely make it. 

“After that we tried to go for an aggressive two-stop strategy but the pace was never there, it was shocking, I tried to push as hard as I could in the car but even with fresher tyres than Fernando I was miles away when he was on used tyres. It was so frustrating, at the moment I don’t understand how we can be that slow during the race, we need to review everything. 

“We changed the front wing and floor I don’t know if that had an impact, we used the mediums in quali that we used again in the race so they were not brand new so I don’t know if that had an impact. I was pushing really hard on the tyre but lap time was never there today.”

AlphaTauri was level on points with Alpine going into Qatar but with the French outfit having both cars in the top five, the gap is now 25 points with two rounds to go.

Gasly was “surprised” he wasn’t able to keep up with Alonso - who finished third - in the first stint of the race.

“Alpine surprised us more than one way this weekend,” Gasly added. “Already their quali pace was impressive, their race pace was really impressive, but I think today was the most impressive performance they have done. 

“To go from Brazil where they were, to here, Fernando is on the podium, is just unbelievable, so I don’t know what they found. This is massive, they were in front of McLaren, in front of Ferrari, at the end of the day we can just congratulate them.”