Early in the Jeddah race, Ocon was in a tough duel with his teammate, two-time world champion Fernando Alonso, for sixth place. The Asturian, with a better pace, attacked the Frenchman on several occasions, but he defended himself tooth and nail for several laps, leaving, on Alonso’s first attempt, a controversial action in the middle of the straight.
With a pink car and being teammates, it was a duel that seemed to revive the years in which Ocon fought with Sergio Pérez at Force India/Racing Point.
Finally from Alpine they asked their pilots to remain calm, which frustrated an Ocon who would later lose position with Bottas . However, he defends his actions.
“Honestly, now the cars are very close, we can follow each other very closely. And attacking is the best defense, and Valtteri was behind us, so it was important to keep the position in front.”
“That’s when the team told me to hold my position. We could basically run if there wasn’t too much contact. That’s what we did. It’s good, it drives the team’s performance and it’s interesting. We have to keep it up.”
In addition, neither Alonso nor Ocon questioned the other, and both maintain that the team lets them fight as long as there is no touch. “It was a lot of fun,” Ocon said of his entertaining run. “Good battles with Lando, good battles with Fernando, with Valtteri. It’s a completely different philosophy now to race these cars, it’s more or less like kart racing.
“And fighting very closely with Fernando, we were very close in all the sessions this weekend, in qualifying we were less than a tenth apart. So it will be even all year. But that is raising the performance of the team “.
As for the battle between teammates allowing their rivals to catch up, Ocon said: “I think of course when you fight, like in karts, you lose time, it’s normal.”
“But at that time, in a one-stop race, track position is very important. And the team allowed us to race. It’s always a privilege to race with Fernando. It makes me smile.”
“He’s excellent in the race, we know, he’s extremely fast. And he’s a legend himself, to fight him is always a privilege. It’s good that we race so close. And it’s good that we can get the team forward.”
“I think he hasn’t slowed down compared to when he was fighting Lewis [Hamilton, his McLaren teammate] in 2007. It’s like a good wine, it matured over the years!”
Last year, Esteban Ocon lost the podium at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix in the final meters of the race, when he had to watch Valtteri Bottas overtake him at the finish line, just 102 thousandths ahead of him.
In 2022, the Frenchman from the Alpine team never challenged for a top-three spot in Jeddah, but in a way he got his revenge: he battled with Lando Norris for the eight points from sixth place on the final lap, beating Briton for just 107 thousandths.
“I remembered last year, what happened, it was exactly the same scenario, but this time we managed to keep the position,” he told Canal+ at the finish line. “But yeah, it was a hot duel at the end with Lando.”
After scoring points in the first two races of the season, Ocon has moved up one position in the overall drivers’ world standings, to sixth place. Alpine also advances, achieving fourth place in the constructors’ championship, although the French team’s spoils would undoubtedly have been greater without the engine failure of Fernando Alonso’s car.
“Two very good weeks, we’ve scored a lot of points on our side of the garage, and that’s great,” added Ocon. “It would also have been a very good result if Fernando hadn’t had a problem. It’s very good for the team and we have to continue in that direction,” concluded the #31.
