Esteban Ocon rued the lack of consistency in his 2023 campaign, after his lowest-scoring season since 2018.
The Alpine driver finished third in the Monaco Grand Prix, the first time he has reached the podium since winning the 2021 Hungarian Grand Prix, and took fourth in the Las Vegas Grand Prix. But the rest of the season was much less successful and he only twice scored in more than two races consecutively over the 22 rounds.
“The consistency, I think this is what we need to get better, clearly,” said Ocon after coming 12th in the standings.
“There were good opportunities that we took, as in Monaco, Las Vegas, stuff like that. But quite a lot [missed], like Singapore and Austin.
“If you take these two, we probably could have been in the top 10 in the championship for drivers. Clearly it does mean that we didn’t maximise this season. It’s going to be important to fix all of those things for next year.”
Ocon qualified eighth for the Singapore Grand Prix and was running sixth when a fault with his gearbox sent him into retirement. He qualified eighth again at the United States Grand Prix but collided with McLaren’s Oscar Piastri, leading to bodywork damage which forced him out a few laps later.
The Alpine driver failed to meet the chequered flag in eight races this season, more than anyone else, due to a combination of incidents and technical problems. The latter ended his participation in the Bahrain season opener.
Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and
Team mate Pierre Gasly crashed into him at the late restart in the Australian Grand Prix and a hydraulics leak put Ocon out early in the British Grand Prix. He was eliminated in a first-corner crash at the Hungarian Grand Prix, a steering fault prompted him to retire from the Italian Grand Prix, and in the sprint race at Losail he was taken out in a three-car collision.
“There’s been some very good things, some very good opportunities that we took, but the consistency overall hasn’t been there and we had too many DNFs,” Ocon admitted. “That has cost us.
“I think it’s [eight] DNFs, probably the most of any drivers. If you remove the issue we have with the gearbox in Singapore and the contact with Oscar in Austin, we could have been in the top 10 in the championship. So that’s where it’s a little bit of a wasted opportunity.”
Ocon scored 58 points, four fewer than Gasly and 16 fewer than Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll who was 10th in the standings. Had Ocon finished…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at RaceFans…