Esteban Ocon believes points were possible for the Alpine Formula 1 team at the Australian Grand Prix without a pit stop to remove a tear-off in his brake duct.
Ocon delivered Alpine’s best-starting berth of the season to date when he advanced to Q2 and qualified 15th, providing him the outside chance of a top-10 finish.
The Frenchman pitted at the end of the ninth lap when he was battling the two Haas drivers, both of whom bagged points, and Alex Albon in the sole Williams car.
But Ocon was required to make a second stop seven laps later to control an escalating overheating issue as a visor tear-off had become lodged in his brake duct.
Alpine would be unable to compensate for the unscheduled stop with an extended second stint to the end, with Ocon pitting for the third and final time on Lap 42.
Ocon was unable to recover the lost ground in Alpine’s overweight and uncompetitive A524 car, dropping behind the two Saubers, who endured further pit stop woes.
“Before the tear-off we were fighting with Kevin, Alex and I was in front of Nico,” Ocon – who classified 16th, three places behind team-mate Pierre Gasly – reflected.
“So we were on for possible points, from ninth to 11th, I think that would have been where we finished today.
“Unfortunately, we’ll never know the outcome, but it was an interesting race.
“I was happy with how we progressed, the pace we had, we were keeping up with these guys. So it was looking good.”
Ocon explained that Alpine had no choice but to make the unplanned pit stop to remove the tear-off, citing that it would have risked sending the car towards retirement.
“On the first lap, I got a tear-off in my mirror, that was the first thing,” he expanded. “And then a couple of laps later, it’s not the same tear-off, it’s another one that goes in my brake duct.
“The whole rear of the car was going to burn, if we didn’t stop. It obviously was the safe thing to do.
“Maybe keeping going would have made us retire, we will never know, so not much that we could have done.
“I also had the radio failing by lap 30. It’s like if the Wi-Fi is horribly bad and it keeps cutting.
“So a lot went wrong a bit with just being unlucky, I would say.
“I think the thing to remember is the progress that we’ve done this weekend, slowly, but hopefully we can keep that going.”
Alpine’s pointless showing ensured it remains bottom of the Constructors’ Championship, but Ocon contends the Enstone squad made progress with its A524 car.
“I think that race has been the strongest out of the three, definitely, in terms of pace and performance,” he assessed.
“It’s good. It means that it’s going in the right direction. Everything’s relative, but relative to the first two, definitely it’s a step up. And the car felt better as well.
“So it’s not only that this track suits the car better – I don’t think it does. I think we set it up much better than [at] the other races.”
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