Tag: Scuderia Alpha Tauri

Scuderia Alpha Tauri’s Yuki Tsunoda had a fantastic 2021 season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix as he ended the race in fourth place and speaking following the action he said:

I’m so happy, what an incredible result to end the season with. I think overall this weekend the car has been really strong, I didn’t expect the race pace to be quite as good but in the end it has been a great day. It’s amazing to be finishing the season on such a high, it’s been a long journey getting back to this point, but I’ve really rebuilt my confidence and it’s great heading into the off-season with this incredible result. Huge congratulations to Max, it was such a tough battle throughout the season and I think he really deserved it today. I want to thank him also for giving this great result to Honda, as he’s given them the best way to celebrate their last year in F1.”

Pierre Gasly had a great race as he came home in fifthcplace and speaking following the action the Frenchman said:

I’m extremely happy to finish in P5 today, it’s the best way to end this year. It’s been an incredible season, the most successful for us as a team in 15 years, we’ve scored a lot of points and there have been many highlights. We’ve focused on ourselves every single race and I think we’ve performed well this season, so I’m really proud of everyone. I’m really pleased for Max, we grew up racing together, we knew he would have been World Champion one day and he did it today. It’s well deserved and I’m also happy for Honda, after all the years of hard work they’ve managed to get this Championship in their final year

Judy Egginton, Technical Director of Alpha Tauri commented saying:

What a fantastic end to the season! Congratulations to Red Bull Racing and Max Verstappen for bringing home the Drivers’ World Championship tonight! With regards to our race in the midfield, Yuki has put together his best weekend of the season, delivering a very strong performance to secure a fourth place finish. Pierre has shown his skill and composure with a good recovery from a difficult Qualifying to bring his car home fifth, adding further points to what is the highest points tally ever scored by the team. The trackside team, drivers and also the staff back in Faenza and Bicester should be very proud with what they have achieved this year. The car and team performed very well in what is a very competitive midfield, demonstrating another clear step forward in the team’s development. We will now close the season with the test, then a well-deserved break before we head off into the 2022 season.”

Scuderia Alpha Tauri Team Principal Franz Tost said:

What an unbelievable race for the final round here in Abu Dhabi. Congratulations to Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing and Honda for winning the World Championship title, they did an incredible job during the year and Max really deserved this. This year he was the fastest driver and the team did a fantastic job.

We are also happy from our side, because today we brought home a very good race result, the best of the year, and collected 22 points with Yuki in 4thand Pierre in 5th position, having started the race in 8thand 12th. We mixed up the strategy, with Yuki starting the race on the Mediums whilst Pierre was on a new set of hard tyres. Both of them did a very clever first stint and managed their tyres very well. Pierre got caught up behind Alonso, I think he could’ve been much faster but nevertheless, thanks to the safety car and very good strategy decisions, the team managed to cross the chequered flag with both drivers in the top 5. We finish the season on 142 points, this is the highest we’ve ever scored in the history of the team and only 13 points behind Alpine. The team made a big step forward in all areas and I’m now really looking forward to next year with hopefully a competitive new car to fight for strong positions.”

Scuderia Alpha Tauri’s Pierre Gasly had a great race as he ended the event in sixth place and speaking following the race he commented saying:

“I’m very pleased with today, finishing in the top six in front of Ferrari, I’m really happy with that result and we’re taking home a lot of points again. We knew it was going to be tricky coming to a new track, but we’ve performed well throughout the weekend and had a strong starting position today. It was a difficult race, with lots of things happening and it was very long, which meant it required a lot of focus. We know how complicated it is into the first corner here, so having three starts was intense, but we tried to take every opportunity we could and in the end I think we did a good job.”

Yuki Tsunoda ended the race in 14th place and speaking following the event he said:

“It’s been a tough afternoon. I struggled at the beginning of the race, but I think the final restart went well and I managed to gain back some places. Unfortunately, I pushed a bit too hard and I had the collision with Vettel. The pace in the car was looking quite good at that point in the race, so I should’ve held off and waited for another opportunity to overtake, it was my mistake and I’ve apologised to him. It’s frustrating as I feel like points were on offer today.”

Team Principal of Scuderia Alpha Tauri Franz Tost said:

Firstly, congratulations to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for this fantastic event here in Jeddah. They’ve built a really great track, although if I had to suggest an improvement that could be made for next year I would say to bring in some more cranes, so that any car involved in accidents can be cleared away quicker, avoiding long red flag periods.

From our side today, Pierre started from P6, but his first start was not so good, and he finished the first lap in eighth position. Yuki started in P8 and also lost some positions on the first lap, but both drivers were able to regain some of them thanks to the red flags. Pierre especially did a really good job coming back after the second red flag and regained P6, which he was able to defend until the chequered flag. He drove another fantastic race today and showed a very strong performance yet again, so well done to him. Yuki also improved a lot in the final stint of the race and was able to overtake a few cars to make his way up to P9. Unfortunately, he then had the collision with Vettel in corner one. I think he did the right thing to try and overtake but, unfortunately, they touched and he sustained damage to the front wing. He had to come in to change it, we put him on the hard tyres and, from then on, he drove a good race with strong lap times. Overall, it was a good first experience in Saudi Arabia for us, with a sixth position from Pierre and with Yuki also showing a really great performance throughout the weekend. We’re now looking forward to the final race in Abu Dhabi, where we hope to have another good last event of this season.

Scuderia Alpha Tauri had a fantastic qualifying under the lights at the Jeddah circuit on Saturday as Pierre Gasly will start the race from fifth place and speaking following the action he said:

“It’s been fantastic again today with another top six Qualifying position. This time it was a bit more difficult, I didn’t feel quite as confident in the car and I struggled with the balance throughout the session. I had to really work as we made our way through Quali, but I managed to put it altogether and I’m really pleased with my lap. I was only two-thousandths behind Sergio, which is nothing, so that’s a bit frustrating but at the end of the day it’s still a great starting position for tomorrow to score points.”

Yuki Tsunoda had a great qualifying too as he ended the session in eighth place and speaking following the action he said:

“I’ve got some mixed feelings about today. I think my performance in Q1 and Q2 was great and I’m really pleased with that, but unfortunately on my final lap in Q3 I had traffic and I lost a lot of time. I think I could’ve been starting further up the grid tomorrow, so it’s frustrating right now. There are lots of positives to take away today though, particularly the fact that I made it through Q2 on the Mediums, so I’ll be starting on the same tyre as everyone else around me tomorrow. It’s a really great track to drive, so I’m looking forward to the race and hopefully we can come away with points.”

Chief Race Engineer Jonathan Eddolls commented saying:

“The team and drivers have done a fantastic job today in Qualifying and I think it’s fair to say they managed to extract the most from the package under quite complicated circumstances, especially whilst trying to understand the tyres on this new circuit. From Friday we knew the car was quick, but we struggled to get the best lap early on in the run, so the focus during FP3 was to try to understand what was required to optimise the car for the first lap of the race. Although we made progress with our understanding in FP3, we still went into Quali with some unanswered questions. This meant that we effectively used Q1 as another practice session to learn more about the Soft tyre, to then help us in Q3, where it would be crucial to extract the most from it. It was a complicated Quali session, much like a wet session, as we made a number of changes to the plan based on the conditions we faced at the time, but the team reacted well and both drivers did a fantastic job throughout. We line up on our preferred side of the grid, with both cars inside the top 10 and starting on medium tyres. We made a number of changes to the car from Friday to improve the long run performance, so we will work hard tonight on the strategy and aim to bring home as many points as we can tomorrow.”

Scuderia Alpha Tauri’s Pierre Gasly had an absolutely fantastic start to his Saudi Arabian Grand Prix weekend on Friday as the Frenchman ended the opening session in fourth place while in the second practice he was third and speaking following the action he commented saying:

“I really like driving this track, the corners are amazing and there’s a big rush of adrenalin when you’re out there. The whole day has been really good for us and I’m pretty happy with the pace so far. We know that on Saturday we usually do quite well, so I’m fairly confident for tomorrow, as I think we can still improve. I don’t feel quite as positive about the long runs though, so we still have some work to do to prepare for the race on Sunday.”

Yuki Tsunoda ended the day in eighth place and speaking following the action he said:

“I’ve enjoyed today a lot as it’s a really fun track, especially the first sector, I’ve never driven a circuit with corners like this before, so it’s been pretty special. I think the pace today has been quite good. The hard tyre already works well here and then I think we need to adapt the car a bit to the other compounds, so we’ve got some work to do. Overall, I think we’re looking quite strong so far. I didn’t manage to complete any long runs yet, but today’s performance makes me positive.”

Chief Race Engineer with Scuderia Alpha Tauri, Jonathan Eddolls commented saying:

“As always, coming to a new track we have to spend some more time initially optimising the setup for the track characteristics and learning about the tyres. Predominately in FP1 the key was to work on the setup requirements to allow us to maximise the car’s potential for the rest of the weekend. The tyres look quite robust here, so we were able to take our learnings from the earlier session and modify our tyre allocation for FP2. The purpose of the second session was to continue our short runs, but also to start understanding the performance of the car on the longer runs, particularly after the challenges of last week. The track has developed a lot between the two sessions, meaning it was quite a struggle to stay on top of the balance of the car. We’ve gathered plenty of data today and for sure there is more lap time to find, so we’ll work hard tonight to get the car in the best place for Qualifying tomorrow.”