Exclusive: A Weekend with Esteban Ocon
Without a main driver seat, Esteban Ocon is maximizing his year as a reserve driver for Mercedes to come back even stronger next season. He told us how a race weekend goes for him.

When Esteban Ocon welcomes us for a one-on-one in the Mercedes motorhome this Saturday afternoon, it’s after a short night’s sleep. But don’t think that the Frenchman has been hitting the nightclubs of rural Styria. No, if the young driver has slept little, it’s because he was busy fine-tuning the team’s settings in the Mercedes simulator.
Indeed, while the regular drivers arrive at the circuit on Thursday, Esteban Ocon stays at the Brackley factory for the first test day: I arrive at the factory on Friday morning to follow the debrief of FP1 and all of FP2. I am connected to the pit wall radio. It’s as if I were on the track. This is when his workday begins since once the debrief of the second free practice session has taken place, the track engineers prepare a test program they wish to conduct, adopting different types of setups: We are looking to have all possible answers in view of qualifying. This is what we do between 5 PM and 2-3 AM.
However, his day does not stop there as he heads to the airport located an hour away by car to catch the first flight to Vienna. After the two-hour drive that separates the Austrian capital from the Red Bull Ring, the young Norman arrives just at the start of the third free practice session to see if his night work has paid off: « As soon as the car is running, I’m connected with the headphones. The engineers often ask me small things because I have tested everything. They find it important to ask for my feedback to make changes, whether on Lewis’s car or Valtteri’s. »
When he is at the circuits, he is determined to be immersed with the various engineering teams that populate the garage: « Recently, I have spent a lot of time with the tire department. It is the department where, as a driver, you can pick up a lot of things. Today, it might account for 50% of the performance. It is therefore important to extract the maximum from it. »
If he is therefore heavily involved in technical preparation, he is also called upon for public appearances with sponsors or interviews, as this helps to relieve the main drivers: « I try to juggle these events and train to maintain my physical level. It’s like driving except there are even more things to manage. »
His schedule is all the more packed as he has also developed a collaborative relationship with Canal+, which has contributed to his understanding of the media industry in the paddock: « I’ve always had good relations with the media, but working directly with them, you realize that it’s really not easy. So, when I return to the track, I’ll try to make their lives a bit easier,” he says with a broad smile.
The question is precisely to what extent he will be able to make his return to competition. While discussions are already underway to prepare for next season, Mercedes and he are currently focused only on returning to F1. Even though the star-branded firm is involved in other official programs, only F1 is currently being discussed.
From our special correspondent in Spielberg