Pierre Gasly says he is making “one step every weekend” as he continues to get up to speed with Red Bull.
Gasly has endured a difficult start to his Red Bull career, having joined as a replacement for Daniel Ricciardo, and has been adrift of Max Verstappen through the opening races.
Gasly converted his grid position to take a subdued sixth in China and picked up the additional point for fastest lap after making a late stop for Soft tyres.
“During the race I tried to keep the rhythm, take care of my tyres and improve my feeling with the car,” he said.
“I’m slowly getting more confident, I think we take one step every weekend but of course I would like to take three every time.
“There is still work for me to do for the next race but the good thing is that I know what I need to improve and what I can do better.
“We are quite happy to finish in the points and take the extra point for fastest lap."
Assessing Gasly’s start to 2019
There’s little doubt that Gasly has endured a sluggish start to his Red Bull career after amassing just 13 points – a third of that gathered by Verstappen, who also has a podium to his name.
In Australia he had a tepid race to 11th spot – though that came after Red Bull misjudged the track evolution in Q1, which left him stranded in the knockout zone.
Bahrain exposed the weaknesses of Red Bull’s RB15, prompting Christian Horner to accept that it needed to work on optimising its chassis, reckoning its narrow operating window was hurting its prospects.
That was later corrected to a set-up gremlin after Red Bull undertook extensive post-race analysis.
But Gasly was nonetheless off the pace of Verstappen and trailed home eighth, having been eliminated in Q2, while the Dutchman took fourth.
In China it was a similar situation pace-wise but in terms of position it left Gasly just one spot back on the grid and two in race trim, making the situation – on paper – slightly less bleak.
Gasly is still trying to adapt his naturally throttle-heavy driving style to the at-times-disobeying RB15: to put simply, he can’t yet drive the car how he wants to.
It is not the first time Gasly has struggled to adapt; in the early months of his GP2 career his aggressive style was fast but flawed as it led to extreme tyre wear. He got it sorted and went on to win the title in his second full year.
He, and Red Bull, will be hoping that the positive words on progress can be translated into on-track results – and soon.
