The team worked flawlessly and Pierre delivered an amazing drive while everyone, from the pit wall, to the mechanics, the entire team in fact, both at the track and in Faenza and Bicester, played their part to perfection. Daniil Kvyat also finished in the points, crossing the line in ninth spot, after fighting his way through the field.
There were effectively two races for the price of one, with the race red flagged after Leclerc’s crash. Our strategy worked out perfectly: Pierre had started P10 and moved up to P3 when the red flag came out. Ahead of him were Hamilton and Stroll. Pierre got another perfect getaway at the restart and soon passed the Canadian, to go second. Hamilton had to come in for a stop-go penalty, having come into the pits earlier when the pit lane was officially closed. This promoted Pierre to the lead.
From then on the race seemed to last an eternity as he headed towards glory. He had Carlos Sainz in the McLaren breathing down his neck for the final ten laps, getting closer and closer. It was a moment of high drama with Carlos able to use DRS when he got to within less than a second of Pierre, but our Frenchman held firm and wrote another page in our Formula 1 history, along with all the team. After his second place in Brazil last year, this time he made it to the top step of the podium to take us to the top of the motorsport world! The French national anthem rang out on the podium for Pierre, the first French F1 winner since Olivier Panis won the 1996 Monaco GP, followed by the Italian one for Scuderia AlphaTauri.
Session Result
POS | DRIVER | TEAM | TIME |
---|---|---|---|
1 | Pierre Gasly | AlphaTauri | 1:47:6:056 |
2 | Carlos Sainz Jr. | McLaren | 1:47:6:471 |
3 | Lance Stroll | Racing Point | 1:47:9:414 |
4 | Lando Norris | McLaren | 1:47:12:56 |
5 | Valtteri Bottas | Mercedes | 1:47:13:164 |
6 | Daniel Ricciardo | Renault | 1:47:14:447 |
7 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | 1:47:23:301 |
8 | Esteban Ocon | Renault | 1:47:24:747 |
9 | Daniil Kvyat | AlphaTauri | 1:47:28:264 |
10 | Sergio Pérez | Racing Point | 1:47:29:280 |
11 | Nicholas Latifi | Williams | 1:47:38:932 |
12 | Romain Grosjean | Haas | 1:47:41:220 |
13 | Kimi Räikkönen | Alfa Romeo | 1:47:42:368 |
14 | George Russell | Williams | 1:47:42:649 |
15 | Alexander Albon | Red Bull | 1:47:43:589 |
16 | Antonio Giovinazzi | Alfa Romeo | 1:48:1:255 |
DNF | Sebastian Vettel | Ferrari | - |
DNF | Kevin Magnussen | Haas | - |
DNF | Max Verstappen | Red Bull | - |
DNF | Charles Leclerc | Ferrari | - |