Jack Doohan says his confidence has grown since the start of F1 2025 season, as he feels if he can get higher up in qualifying, it will make things easier.
It has been a mixed start to F1 2025 campaign for Alpine’s Doohan. He has shown glimpses of performances during race weekends, but hasn’t been outstanding as yet to steer himself away from the constant ‘to be replaced by Franco Colpainto’ rumour.
Out of the five rounds, Japan was the toughest in terms of his FP2 crash. Granted Alpine hasn’t shown their best as well, with just one points result courtesy Pierre Gasly, but Doohan hasn’t qualified well enough to put himself in contention to fight for the Top 10 as yet.
He feels if he can get his qualifying sorted, it will help him a lot. The confidence is there and is getting better as the season progresses. “We’re having to put a lot of focus onto the tyres,” said Doohan to media. “I think we’re there or thereabouts on the qualifying pace.
“Once we start a bit further up, then we can be in a bit more sync, not be so adventurous on the strategy, and things will just roll over a little bit more. When we’re on the back foot, like we were [in Saudi], it was a little bit of a snowball, and it went from more difficult to more difficult.
“It’s obviously a sprint in Miami, but the goal is to start on the front foot, be inside the top 10 in qualifying, and then do our best to stick there for the race. My confidence in this paddock, inside the car, working with the team has grown.
“I’m continuing to learn how to optimise my package and also how to optimise our PU unit. Every lap I’m still learning, but I’m getting more and more confident,” summed up Doohan, who is raring to fight with rivals for points, as he discussed with Gabriel Bortoleto in Saudi Arabia, who is struggling as well to show his value considering the car he is in.
“Me and Gabi were speaking about this earlier,” said Doohan. “We said that hopefully very soon we’re having these fights, but in the points further up and not for the final positions on track. Just a very tough day. I’m going to keep my head down and focus on what’s ahead. We have a nice period where we can switch off, reset, and have a couple of days in the simulator.”
Here’s Pierre Gasly on incident with Yuki Tsunoda
