Esteban Ocon on Alpine's 'all-in' strategy at the 2023 F1 Azerbaijan GP

Esteban Ocon recently spoke about the 'all-in' strategy Alpine used after the Frenchman was forced to start from the pit lane during the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

The race in Baku was a tough one for the French outfit, especially after Ocon had issues with his setup after the first practice session. Alpine broke the Parc Ferme rules by making changes to Ocon's car and the driver had to start both the sprint and main races from the pit lane, making it difficult to compete.

Given their disadvantage in terms of starting position, Alpine's strategic decisions were crucial to score any points and remain competitive. However, the strategy that Alpine used didn't turn out to be the perfect one. Ocon said on the F1 Nation podcast:

"We were trying to get back through the field and try an all-in strategy, that was the term. It was working well, until that moment we had to pit, unfortunately, and the safety car didn't come at the right time. So, it was not completely a test session, but there is a lot to review."

Esteban Ocon also felt that the car was not performing at its maximum level, as there was a lot more pace in it which couldn't be extracted.

"I don't think it is the true pace of the car, I think we had more in hands but, obviously, we didn't put it together, and we didn't use the potential properly this weekend."

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Esteban Ocon suggests new Sprint weekend format was part of the problem for Alpine in Baku

The new Sprint Race Weekend format, which made its debut in Baku, included just a single practice session. Alpine team principal Otmar Szafnauer had earlier suggested that their set-up suffered due to the limited time available. Esteban Ocon had a similar verdict, as he said:

"We had only one session, we did three laps in that session in practice, and you know, from there on, we had to change the setup, because it was a critical issue that we had to fix. And yeah, I mean, things kept getting worse each session."

Esteban Ocon started the race on hard tires and did not pit until the final lap. However, this didn't yield any results as he finished P15 and didn't gain any points from the race.

Ocon's teammate Pierre Gasly finished just ahead of him in P14, making it a zero-point weekend for Alpine. However, they are expecting a much better weekend of racing in Miami.