Pierre Gasly reckons driving for Alpine is another way to remember his best friend Anthoine Hubert. Hubert was a young driver making his way through the junior categories. He was racing F2 when an incident at Eau Rouge cost his life. Hubert had won two races in his rookie season in F2 and was on his way to F1 in 2019.
Hubert was an Alpine academy racing driver and was destined to make his way into F1. Looking back, his best friend Gasly feels that him driving for the same team Hubert was supposed to be a part of is a way of remembering him even more. Gasly told Motorsport.com:
“I knew Anthoine was an Alpine driver, a French driver; he was really liked within the academy. Between all of us drivers, we knew that Alpine would be quite keen to bring a French driver to the top. And he was on his way to Formula 1. Obviously when this (move) happened, it was definitely something I thought about, and about the family. It just felt like quite a nice story to make this move."
He added:
“I’ve always said it, we always had this common dream of making it to Formula 1, me and Anthoine. He had his dream to perform with Alpine. If it’s something I can achieve in a way to remember Anthoine even more within my life, that would be amazing.”
Pierre Gasly shared news of joining Alpine with Hubert's family
Pierre Gasly has said that he shared the news of him joining Alpine and replacing Fernando Alonso with Hubert's family. He said:
“I have a couple of anecdotes that I’ll mention later, but that I want to share with his Mum. It’s definitely something that I carry with me all the time.”
Gasly will team up with Esteban Ocon at Alpine this season. The French driver will have a great opportunity to finally be part of a works team after a long time.
The Frenchman had received an immediate promotion to Red Bull in 2019 but endured a disappointing season alongside Max Verstappen. Because of a lack of results, Gasly lost his seat to Alex Albon midseason and has been trying to gain that promotion since then.
The partnership at Alpine could be a start of something big for Pierre Gasly if all the cards fall in place.