After leading the morning session and improving the sensations of an Alpine A522 that until now had been more of a protagonist due to its problems than its performance, Esteban Ocon returned to the asphalt to contest the last four hours of testing this Friday, March 11, but had to stop its testing program early.
As happened on the last day of testing in Barcelona, where the French team’s single-seater left Fernando Alonso on the track due to a problem related to the power unit, the Alpine A522’s Renault engine failed again on the second day test in Bahrain, although this time with the French driver at the wheel.
The car ran out of power and Ocon could not even return to the pits by his own means, leaving worried faces inside the garage of the French structure, including that of an Alonso who was currently on the pit wall parsing the session.
This incident caused the first red flag of the afternoon and the Alpine mechanics quickly reached the area where the French driver had been forced to stop the car.
Together with the help of the track marshals and with Ocon already back in a garage where concern was palpable, the French team’s mechanics tried to cover the A522 as quickly as possible to prevent any photographer from capturing compromising snapshots .
A few minutes later, the crane transported the car back to the garage so that Alpine personnel could carry out the corresponding checks and try to solve a problem related to the power unit that has not yet been revealed.
Alpine and Ocon were able to return to the tarmac with 35 minutes left in the day, and after seeing the investigation into the mishap, they decided to put the A522 on the track to take advantage of the last moments of this Friday.
