For several years now, Formula 1 has been dealing with a particular issue week after week: congestion in the pit lane. The phenomenon and the problems associated with it also cropped up again during the sprint qualifying in Spielberg. However, the time of the incident was not, as is usually the case, the first qualifying section, in which 20 drivers still have to share the track, but SQ3 with only ten active drivers.
Sprint qualifying is a special case, however. In this qualifying, teams usually only have one attempt to secure pole position for the sprint. This means great chaos and jostling in the pit lane to get the best possible distance and track position. This situation particularly affected two drivers today: Sergio Perez and Pierre Gasly.
Gasly criticizes Alpine management: No more battery on the fast lap
“Overall, it was a good qualifying with both cars in SQ3. Unfortunately, we did a poor job in the last section, we almost didn’t manage to complete a lap,” said the Frenchman bluntly. “I had to push hard on my out lap and then ran out of battery on my final lap and was also in Checo’s gearbox. [Sergio Perez, d. Red.]. We have to look into it because these are exactly the situations where we can improve. But we had a good pace, just a bit of a shame with the last part of qualifying.”
Perez blames Ocon for qualifying failure: Doesn’t know what he was planning
Sergio Perez’s preparation lap also went anything but smoothly due to the pit lane chaos. However, the Mexican himself bears some of the blame. Because although Esteban Ocon, who had track position ahead of Perez in the pit lane, had already moved a good bit ahead, the Red Bull driver did not think it necessary to quickly go on his out lap. “What is that guy doing there?” radioed Gasly, who had to wait behind Perez.

Instead, Perez crept out of the pit lane at what felt like walking pace. When his race engineer told him that time might be tight, Perez pressed the brush and ruined the working window of his tires. By turn 7, Perez received feedback from his race engineer that he would not be able to start a lap at his current pace.
In the end, Perez just managed to cross the line in time – with Pierre Gasly in tow and Esteban Ocon in front of him. The result of the poor preparation was another disappointing seventh place for the sprint and a gap of 1.322 seconds to pole sitter and teammate Max Verstappen.
After the race, however, Perez did not want to hear anything about his own fault in his position. He put the blame on the driver in front of him and the Alpine sandwich. “Unfortunately, I don’t know what Esteban did,” he said, confused by his former teammate’s driving behavior. “Obviously he had to drive very slowly and therefore I had to do my last lap within half a second of him. I had practically no chance.”
What didn’t help with the whole chaos was that Charles Leclerc’s engine gave out in the middle of the Alpine-Perez construct and all the protagonists had to weave their way past the Ferrari driver. You can read exactly what that was all about here: