Pierre Gasly

Jack is not happy me included and so does everyone else working at Alpine including the fans cheering for the team itself other than Pierre Gasly who continues to keep in check with the Top 10 zone.

As said, that Saudi street track in Jeddah is extremely tricky in a risk v reward situation – good for some but not so much for others even if he’s a rookie at F1 level.

So far it didn’t go Jack’s way with his tire management and discipline for the wrong reasons but at least he didn’t crash though and isn’t the slowest out either.

Again, he will have to work harder from 17th on the grid and be in sync with his crew upstairs that will hopefully take 50 laps to get past his best result 13th or even better with points for the first time.

Must say that this weekend has been promising so far not just from Pierre but also Jack too in both Alpine-Renault cars.

Hats off to Pierre being the team leader out of this including his amazing Q3 performance & his FP1 lap times too that puts him in 4th ahead of tomorrow.

Even though Jack made a bit of mistakes here and there, his run ain’t bad either where he also had some sound practice times including his extended run into Q2 and almost got into Q3 just by a hairline or two. But starting 11th tomorrow? It’s a good time to chase up now & go for the best possible Top 7-8 points as he can.

Not holding my breath just yet…

But as long as he does not crash (please!) and as long as he does not make up more some silly mistakes and as long as he is being careful while fighting like a dog, happy for JD7 to go all in and leave Sakhir, Bahrain from there filled with confidence. 

Nothing more he could ask other than points, points, points…over to you Jack.

It wasn’t a bad day for Jack Doohan in 15th thanks to his good start from 19th along with his scrambled defensive race moves & a well-timed long run strategy.

Alright he could’ve done anything a bit better especially without much use of the DRS had he not let Pierre pass him when it’s a team calling after Pierre lost his way in the pits.

Then Carlos Sainz did pass him with a few laps to go for 14th when his Williams car is powered by a Mercedes engine & not a Renault one + also his tires worked well in his favour unlike Jack on older hard sets.

But he has came from a long way though from a high speed crash into Turn 1 the other day Friday to getting the most out of a repaired A525 because at the end of the day, he’s just wanting to have a clean race like he always wanted from Round 1.

Say what you want but Jack had to make the most out of himself from nothing when he didn’t get to run opening practice yesterday because Ryo Hirakawa was there and then he suddenly crashed at high speed going into Turn 1 when he forgot to turn off the DRS – glad to hear he was okay on what has been a scary one indeed.

Look at Pierre with his own if it wasn’t for Jack’s China PU replacement as well as the repaired chassis, then at least he would make Q2 again & sit in 12th-15th. 

It’s not easy work when his engineers had to race against the clock all night long just for Jack to get back in the car again the next day but now he has to be point from 19th so he can show some race pace for race day tomorrow. 

As long as he stays out of it and not crash again like it was with his unexpected debut at Abu Dhabi last year, you’ll see…

This weekend is a non-Formula 1 race weekend after back-to-back early races of the new season but as we know now, Red Bull decided to promote Yuki and demote Liam between the senior and secondary teams going forward for next weekend’s Japanese GP at Suzuka Circuit.

While we wish Franco Colapinto could be right up there at least for their secondary team, we still need Jack Doohan to be at his absolute best so he can stay with Alpine-Renault for a little bit longer.

Yes, he has the raw pace who has the ability to match his team-mate Pierre Gasly across practice and qualifying.

However, his race form still needs a lot of work while cutting those ill-disciplines that alienated some fans along the way – me included to be honest. Although happy to take 13th based on the final race results from the previous one last week in China.

At the end of the day, it’s Alpine’s responsibility to get the best out of their own A525 cars, especially when the Renault engine is unfortunately is not on the same wavelength as other PU engine makers – and yet they’re the only team not scoring any points so far (10th in teams’ points at present).

No idea why their performances towards the back end of 2024 was oh so good at least fighting Top 5-7 to just going toe-to-toe at least against the Sauber & secondary Red Bull cars at the moment.

Fortunately, got Jordan King onboard who is also part of the Alpine squad as a development driver to talk through it with some words of optimism there to our Aussie JD7 O.K!

Not much going on today in Shanghai from Jack other than the new PU fit not helping him much in between 14th to 16th when Pierre wasn’t bad just outside Top 10 while he could’ve gambled a bit with the mediums where Ollie Bearman and Lance Stroll was able to look past his shoulder.

Yes, he was able to make up 1-2 spots that late over both secondary Red Bulls but just can’t believe he forced Isack Hadjar off the track at that same corner where he got into Gabriel Bortoleto from the opening sprint race early yesterday & he got a penalty for it from 14th now 16th.

Don’t know much else to say but shame there’s no recourse, plus he still needs to improve his cornering (that should help him better when overtaking drivers without being silly) & most importantly, that poor Renault engine he’s got right now.

Also shoutout to fellow Aussie Oscar Piastri with the win for McLaren-Mercedes!

Update: Felt sorry for Pierre whose car was caught underweight along with two Ferraris and they were all DQed, so Jack finished 13th instead – could’ve been 11th if it wasn’t for that penalty. But again, he still needs to keep up going into Japanese round.

It wasn’t the day Jack Doohan wanted to see and hear from the top brass at Alpine on big day Saturday from the sprint race to feature qualifying.

Let’s start by replacing his PU count that seems to be the achilles heel of his sprint race setup when Pierre was a few places ahead of him from 17th to 12th while he was right in between 18th-19th before he got into Gabriel Bortoleto whilst trying to get past him on the last lap for 18th and he came home last.

Yes, his raw pace is on par as always even though the team’s qualifying run were bang average for both cars in Q1 as he will have to start 18th & Pierre from 16th.

But at the end of the day, he just needs to be bit more careful with the cornering as if we remove the “drag racing” part from this sport. That’s where he got so wrong a few times even on the dry conditions including the last turn of his last-pitched timed lap – let’s hope he can fix all of that, so he can follow the $$$ for tomorrow.

Things may not have gone his way today when it comes to the problems of the car during the one and only practice session by Jack Doohan at Alpine such as that power steering issue while the Renault engines he’s got there didn’t help much at present.

However, one thing he done good though on opening day Friday in Shanghai was being on par with his team-mate (Pierre Gasly) where he was slightly faster than him – despite both unable to get past the first stage of sprint qualifying.

Although there’s another chance coming up early tomorrow where Jack will roll off 16th & Pierre in 17th for the first selected sprint race of the year.

And if it wasn’t for that super Ollie Bearman timed lap at the last minute for Haas-Ferrari, then Jack could have gone through to another second round of qualifying for a bit longer right there. 

For now, let’s hope the car can give Jack the boost he needs this weekend starting with solid Top 10-12 outings both sprint race & feature qualifying.