For the primary time because the pair began sharing the System 1 grid, Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly joined one another on the rostrum of a grand prix, capitalising on a daring technique in a moist Interlagos basic to complete second and third behind the untouchable Max Verstappen.
It was an enormous enhance to Alpine, the crew gaining three locations within the constructors’ championship and eventually getting a tangible reward for the onerous work of its crew after a bruising season with the underperforming 2024 automotive.
The scintillating Sao Paulo basic was not simply season-defining for Alpine: on a human stage, it would additionally without end outline Ocon’s and Gasly’s at occasions fraught relationship.
Rising up shut to one another in japanese Normandy, Ocon and Gasly crossed paths as youngsters and have become finest pals, spending a lot of time collectively racing go-karts.
As they moved up the ladder their relationship soured, seemingly past restore, and due to this fact Gasly becoming a member of Ocon as a team-mate at Alpine for 2023 raised some eyebrows within the paddock. Ocon admitted “we’re by no means going to be finest pals” on the time, whereas Gasly acknowledged his relationship could be vastly totally different to the one he loved with Yuki Tsunoda earlier than.
Esteban Ocon, Alpine F1 Staff, 2nd place, Pierre Gasly, Alpine F1 Staff, third place, have a good time in Parc Ferme
Picture by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Photographs
Naturally there have been some flashpoints on observe, similar to Ocon had with some earlier team-mates – Fernando Alonso and Sergio Perez – and each drivers fought their nook onerous over crew technique as you’ll count on any F1 racers to do.
In 2023 there was a collision in Melbourne, of their fourth race collectively, and this 12 months the pair additionally got here to blows when Ocon lunged down the within of Gasly in Monaco, damaging each automobiles and angering each Gasly and Alpine’s administration. Quickly after Ocon introduced his departure from the crew, signing with Haas for 2025, which defused a few of the stress but additionally appeared to acknowledge that Ocon’s arrival on the Enstone crew hadn’t actually labored out for both get together.
However whereas the pair has at all times maintained they work nicely collectively off-track, it appears like their healthful podium in Brazil has additional thawed their as soon as frosty relations. They did not simply revel of their hard-earned success on the again of an abysmal 12 months with Alpine, however the perilous moist race in Interlagos appeared to unlock a heat feeling of nostalgia to raised days. A time once they had been additionally racing on the entrance in fraught circumstances, as 10-year-old prodigies of Normandy’s go-karting scene.
Because the pair gave a joint interview in entrance of broadcaster Viaplay’s cameras, Ocon turned to his fellow Norman: “Do you bear in mind once we had been driving in Anneville within the rain?”, to which Gasly revealed their race had introduced again the identical reminiscences.
“Yeah, even within the snow! We had been driving within the snow and the rain. It is the identical because it was again within the day once we had been the one ones displaying up on the observe within the rain, freezing chilly. However it was all price it.”
“It paid off at present,” Ocon nodded after his automotive management within the Brazilian rain yielded him second. “Once we did that formation and the in-lap, that was the very first thing that got here to my thoughts. What a wonderful story, that.”
Even again when Gasly joined Ocon at Alpine final 12 months, the importance of their unlikely pairing was not misplaced on them. Two youngsters from the identical a part of France – Gasly from the Rouen space and Ocon from the close by city of Evreux – each making it by means of the difficult journey to System 1 to finish up as team-mates.
Now they’ve one other fond reminiscence to look again on after their careers, when maybe their rivalry shall be a relic of the previous.
“That is the second of a lifetime,” mentioned Gasly. “As youngsters from the place we got here from, to finish up as team-mates was already towards all odds, however to finish up on the identical podium…
“No one is aware of our story, it is one thing private to us. However no matter all the things that occurred, a day like at present makes it very particular.
“It is a wonderful story.”