Pierre Gasly’s cry for updates has been answered, the Frenchman confirming that AlphaTauri have brought revised bodywork and a new floor to the Paul Ricard circuit.
Losing ground to their rivals in recent weeks, Gasly was frustrated after a lacklustre Austrian Grand Prix had both AlphaTauri drivers finishing at the back of the field.
He told the media that the team “can’t keep going like this” and “desperately need this upgrade on the car to be able to get any decent result”.
AlphaTauri have heeded his call, the team arriving at the Paul Ricard circuit for the Frenchman’s home race with a new floor as well as revised bodywork.
Gasly is excited.
a special lid for a home grand prix ?
looking good @PierreGASLY! ?? pic.twitter.com/CsyRbZPFdh
— Scuderia AlphaTauri (@AlphaTauriF1) July 18, 2022
“I’m hoping things will get much better with the updates we will have on the car this weekend,” said the 26-year-old.
“They are mainly on the aero-side and they should deliver a real step up in performance, so I’m keen to try them out at Ricard, in the hope that they can put us back in the fight for points.”
He has not scored since his P5 at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
As for his team-mate Yuki Tsunoda, he hopes the updates, which are set to address the AT03’s medium to high-speed corner weakness, will mean a top-ten showing is possible come Sunday.
“It’s a track where you need a set-up that works well in mid-speed corners and it can be quite tricky because you have the high-speed straight and Signes corner, but also low and medium-speed turns at the end of sectors 1 and 3,” he said.
“Normally, this would highlight some weak points in our car, but we will have updates in France so hopefully that won’t be the case anymore.
“It’s really time we return to getting into Q3 to make it easier to score points on Sunday.
“We’ve gone for a major upgrade rather than lots of small ones. The new upgrade is focused on adding more load to the car, as we were quite weak in the medium to high-speed corners.
“Hopefully, it will bring us more consistency and allow us to fight at the top of the midfield again.”
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