BWT Alpine F1 Team’s Sporting Director, Alan Permane, will be hoping that both Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso can utilise the strong race pace of the A522 to finish well inside of the points as the team looks to clinch fourth place in the Constructors’ Championship.
Ocon qualified for Sunday’s Abu Dhabi Grand Prix in eighth place after just missing out on seventh place to Lando Norris and rivals McLaren F1 Team. Alonso on the other hand, was unable to make it into the top ten after struggling for pace in the session and could only put the car in eleventh.
However, the Spaniard will move up one place to tenth for the race after Daniel Ricciardo who qualified ahead of him, has a three place grid penalty following an incident between himself and Haas F1 Team driver Kevin Magnussen last weekend in Brazil.
This will be Alonso’s last race for the Alpine team as he will take the seat of the retiring Sebastian Vettel at Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant Formula One Team from next year.
Alpine lead McLaren in the championship by nineteen points as Alan Permane, is hoping that the team can end their great season on a high note and secure fourth place in the standings.
“We will start tomorrow’s final race of the year with Esteban in eighth and Fernando in tenth and we’re generally quite pleased with those starting spots. Fernando didn’t quite extract the most from the car today missing a tenth or two throughout – and his focus is already on tomorrow’s race where we know we are strong.”
“This circuit has always been quite tricky for Qualifying with cooling track temperatures and traffic as cars queue in the final sector, which brings difficulties in keeping the tyres in a good window. Esteban and his team did a great job in managing those elements today to qualify in eighth place and he was close to sneaking seventh by just half a tenth of a second.”
“We’re looking forward to tomorrow’s race where the aim is to utilise our strong race pace and have both cars well inside the points to end the season on a high note.”
