The French driver leaves DAMS and joins new-comer in GP2 Series, Prema Powerteam. He also places himself as a serious challenger for the title.
Pierre Gasly has been really successful in World Series by Renault being Eurocup champion in 2013 and runner-up in Formula Renault 3.5 in 2014. He raced in GP2 Series for the first time the same year at Monza with Caterham.
He joins DAMS in 2015 for his first full-time season in the category but despite three pole-positions, his best result was a second place at Hungaroring and at Sochi. He finishes the season with the same amount of point than teammate Alex Lynn and Raffaele Marciello, but with his results, he ends up eighth in the championship.
For the 2016 season, Gasly joins Italian team Prema Powerteam, racing their maiden season in GP2 series, but also reigning on the European championship of Formula 3 since 2012. He comments:
“My priority is clearly to win the GP2 series and I couldn’t be doing it with a better group of people than the Prema team.
“They have won a lot of championships and while they know that moving up to GP2 will be a great challenge we are confident that we can win.”
Pierre Gasly will be the only driver with experience in GP2 in the team as he will be paired with Antonio Giovinazzi, runner-up in Formula 3 last year. It shut down the rumors of Felix Rosenqvist joining the team, even if he won the Formula 3 championship last year with the seam. Team manager, René Rosin, explains his choice:
“We could not have selected a better driver for our maiden GP2 Series campaign. Gasly is an extremely talented and skilled driver who delivered convincing performances in all the championship he entered so far.”
Pierre Gasly is the only 2015 Red Bull junior driver to continue in the program in 2016 and has already confirmed he would stay reserve driver for Red Bull Racing in 2016.