Jack Doohan says learning when to push going into 2025 will be key after F1 debut, as he notes of pressure plus being teammate to Pierre Gasly.
Doohan secured an unexpected F1 debut in Abu Dhabi GP when Esteban Ocon decided to end his ties with Alpine early to start with Haas in the test. The Australian was drafted in and his primary objective was to help the team finish ahead of Haas in the constructors’ championship.
He didn’t score but did his part. It also helped him to learn a lot before his full season in 2025. He got through the process early and the jitter of first race is gone as well. One thing that got him was when and how to push on the hard tyres especially, relating to tyre preservation.
“Leaning how much to push on the first sort of 20 laps on that hard tyre on the second stint in Abu Dhabi, I obviously came past Bottas, who was struggling quite a lot on the hard and I didn’t really know how much to push,” said Doohan to media. “I didn’t want to overcook it on my first race and lose out to K-Mag – I didn’t really know where he was.
“I think I can push more and use the tyre a little bit more, but nevertheless, I’m grateful that I finished the race and took so much learning from it. A lot of knowledge and so much learning, and I’m super grateful for every lap, for the experience, and super grateful to the team. There is learning to be done on the hard tyre, happy to finish on the same pace as others on the same strategy towards the end of the race.
“So just looking forward to taking this all into next season,” summed up Doohan. The Australian shared some insights on working with Gasly on a race weekend as well. He knows there is pressure to deliver and hopes to do so while working in tandem with the Frenchman.
“I think he [Gasly] assisted me where he could,” recalled Doohan. “We stayed quite late on Friday night together, to be honest an hour after curfew, looking over all the out-lap procedures together, looking at what others are doing, how it compares to us. But to be honest, we focused on ourselves quite a lot.
“I just focused on my crew, he focused on his crew and we tried to take what we could from each other. He’s obviously a class driver, a great result for him, running third for most of that first stint. So I look forward to learning a lot from him and being able to be a great pairing for next season. Obviously there’s pressure. I want to be performing next year — I don’t feel pressure though.
“I think our one-lap pace was really strong. Within half a tenth to a tenth of a Pierre, we got just super unlucky in the last run of Q1 with just poor traffic management on the out-lap and difficult positioning. Couldn’t ask for much more in a difficult circumstance, so I think that’s a strong point. And then learning on my first full race, so a lot to take forward into next year and hopefully hit the ground running,” summed up Doohan.
Here’s Pierre Gasly seeing positive change in April-May itself
Here’s Oliver Oakes on Esteban Ocon
Here’s Alpine, Esteban Ocon after Abu Dhabi Test
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