Turkish Grand Prix – Esteban Ocon equals a performance that is 24 years old
By not going through the pit lane, Esteban Ocon achieved a real feat! Indeed, it had been 24 years and 449 Grand Prix since a driver had not stopped during a Formula 1 race (excluding race interruptions). But who was the last driver to have pulled off this stunt?
Pirelli tires were at the center of debates this weekend on the Istanbul track, between rain and grip, teams have racked their brains, sometimes with big misses! During the race, while some played it safe by putting on a second set of intermediate tires on a drying track, others tried, and even succeeded, to reach the checkered flag without going through the pit lane.
If we can praise Sebastian Vettel’s attempt on slicks on a track where a dry trajectory was emerging, the real question was whether these intermediate tires could withstand the full 58 laps of the race. On their side, Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton did everything to bring their tires to the end of this race, they had to resign themselves to putting on an additional set of intermediate tires with regret and bitterness.
The only one to have succeeded in the feat of bringing his tires to the end of a 58-lap race was Esteban Ocon and his Alpine. The Norman finished 10th, earning an important point for the French team. After seeing big points slip away during the collisions Alonso – Gasly then Alonso – Schumacher, Alpine did everything to bring back one more point in the constructors’ world championship, even if it meant taking a risk of a puncture on Esteban Ocon’s car. Just look at the state of Esteban Ocon’s right front tire to realize the significant degradation of his tires.
😮💨 (My face after crossing the line)! Risky one but we are happy to get a reward to finish with 👌🏻🔥 #EO31 #turkishgp pic.twitter.com/uZZN93XdxV
— Esteban Ocon (@OconEsteban) October 10, 2021
The most recent driver to have completed an entire Grand Prix without stopping at the pits was the Finnish driver Mika Salo, at the 1997 Monaco Grand Prix. He managed to secure a 5th place finish on a wet track, starting from the 14th position with a modest Tyrrell-Ford.
#HappyBirthday Mika Salo, 54. Pic: scoring Tyrrell’s final #F1 points, 5th, Monaco ’97, coolly delivering on Mike Gascoyne’s bold zero-pitstop strategy, the last in F1 history, hatched out of the realisation that a wet #MonacoGP would be time-limited, not distance-limited. (1/2) pic.twitter.com/stPb34Lwu8
— Matt Bishop 🏳️🌈 (@TheBishF1) November 30, 2020
