Esteban Ocon couldn’t have his own race in F1 Monaco GP and despite the points, he hopes FIA bans the too far backing up tactics in the future.
After starting the weekend poorly, Haas’ Ocon turned it around in F1 Monaco GP in qualifying after finishing eighth in the order. It was a surprise for everyone and that set up his race well for Sunday. He was in the pack involving both the Visa Cash App RB and Williams cars.
Liam Lawson started that tactics to save Isack Hadjar. At that time, it felt like Ocon will miss out. But Williams did the same behind with Alexander Albon and Carlos Sainz. They eventually held back the Mercedes pair and also Red Bull’s Yuki Tsunoda from coming through.
This allowed Ocon to maintain his track position and finish one better in seventh due to the retirement of Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso. The Frenchman felt the team maximised everything especially since it helped them to stay ahead of Visa Cash App RB by four points.
“Very stressful,” started Ocon. “It opened up a lot of things early on and there was twice the amount of management about when to push, when to create the gap and it was not easy to get everything right. We kept chatting with Laura the whole way through the race, but I think we’ve maximised what we had in our hands. Well done to Isack because he didn’t put a foot wrong the whole weekend.
“He was a bit quicker in qualifying and obviously ended up in front in the race, so that’s where we deserve to finish. But a well executed weekend from the whole team, from qualifying to the race, and we can be pleased with that. Six points is a big thing for us, so happy. I had a buffer in the back with Liam, but Isack was just backing off so much that he caught up 24 seconds towards the end.
“I was like: ‘Oh yeah, 24 seconds gap!’ And then five laps later he was in the back of us pretty much. But I didn’t have enough of a gap to pit in from what I believe, because Liam just cleared Isack but Isack was six or seven seconds in front because I had Fernando in between. On that side it didn’t really help my race, but it was quite difficult to see who was doing tactics, who didn’t have pace.
“Fernando struggled a little bit at one point with pace and we managed to clear him before he had the issue, so that was the really only the real fight we had on track,” summed up Ocon. The Frenchman, though, didn’t like the tactics overall to back up and hopes the FIA bans it eventually. It led to lots of frustration which included the pass from George Russell.
He put forward an idea to maybe remove the chicane at Turn 10 which will open up an overtaking zone, but at the same time felt Monaco remains unique and everyone knows about it. “I think it was like we are done with our two stops and then we are okay, we stay there,” said Ocon. “I think there is no magic trick to that race.
“[To improve Monaco you could] maybe have no chicane and then straight into Turn 12, but there would not be a lot of run-off to brake [from high speed] there. Maybe there would be overtakes if we do that. We love Monaco as it is. I don’t think we should do artificial stuff with it. It’s Monaco, we know. Still a lot of people turned up and we had a lot of support around the track, so let’s keep it like that.
“I think, honestly, these tactics, this race, with people driving four seconds off the pace, was not nice. It’s super artificial, it’s a lot of team orders and it’s not pure as a sport, as we love it. This is not DTM and we want this to stay pure to a certain extent, so that should be banned from the FIA and I’m sure people will look at it, because you can’t just back everyone up three seconds a lap like that. It’s not really fair on others,” summed up Ocon.
