AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly is looking to ‘make a step forward’ at this weekend’s 2022 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix.
Following a difficult start to the season in Bahrain with a power unit failure, Gasly has bounced back with six points in the last two races in Saudi Arabia and Australia, where he was happy to finish ninth despite enduring a “less straightforward weekend” in Melbourne with a lack of “pure speed” in his car.
Gasly however has iterated in AlphaTauri’s preview for their home race at Imola, Italy, this weekend that there is more progress to be made, as he said: “We know we still have work to do, we must bring more performance to the package and that’s the plan for Imola this week.”
The Frenchman also has glanced one eye across the grid as he noted how “very quick” McLaren and Alpine seem at the front of the midfield battle, although he believes that he doesn’t need to be able “to find much performance to be able to improve.”
Looking ahead specifically to the Emilia Romagna GP, Gasly added that he feels like progress can be achieved in front of home fans as he continued: “It would be nice if we can make a step forward in Imola.
“It’s a track I really like, to start with because it’s very close to the factory, so everyone wants to do really well as we have more support from the crowd than usual, and it has a very special atmosphere.”
Gasly has excellent single-lap pace around Imola with two top-five finishes in Qualifying so is targeting his “best result of the season” this weekend, with the addition of a Sprint Qualifying Race on Saturday as well as the main race on Sunday.
Explaining how he intends to approach this weekend, Gasly concluded: “Overtaking is quite tricky, as the track is narrow, so it will be important to focus on Qualifying on Friday, before dealing with the added challenge of the Sprint Race on Saturday, which this year is another opportunity to score points.”
Yuki Tsunoda meanwhile endured a frustrating Australian GP as he qualified 13th on the grid but only managed to finish the race in 15th position, which he described as “a tough weekend” despite visiting Melbourne for the first time.
Tsunoda however insists that Imola will make for “an interesting weekend” at the team’s home race which features the first of Sprint Qualifying Races this season, followed by Austria and Brazil later in the campaign.
The 21 year-old Japanese driver though feels better prepared than last season for this weekend format as he feels “much more confident” about his approach to the Sprint weekend format, after previous fears of having a single practice session before Qualifying in 2021.
Tsunoda also pointed to the fact that the first Sprint weekend format is at Imola as another motivational boost, given his experience of the circuit with AlphaTauri, which means that he is more familiar and confident heading into the weekend.
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