Pierre Gasly could talk for ‘hours’ about issue every Max Verstappen teammate faces after Sergio Perez exit

Pierre Gasly has found a home at Alpine and just finished his second season with the team in a year of improvement.

The Frenchman drove well this season, and Alpine improved after being the slowest car in the championship’s opening few rounds.

Gasly had some personal highlights, such as a superb drive to third place in the rain at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix.

He then kept up the momentum at the penultimate round of the season in Qatar with a fifth-place finish, which helped Alpine take sixth in the Constructors’ Championship.

Alpine’s lead driver was very consistent in 2024, and former Formula 1 driver Jolyon Palmer feels Gasly is the best driver outside the top teams.

The early part of Gasly’s career was much more unstable. For the first half of 2019, he struggled at Red Bull alongside Max Verstappen.

David Meija revealed that Gasly said he would need a lot of time to explain one problem he faced while being teammates with Verstappen.

Pierre Gasly feels he was ‘served second’ at Red Bull alongside Max Verstappen

Verstappen has been the clear number one driver at Red Bull since Daniel Ricciardo left to join Renault at the end of 2018.

The Dutchman was much quicker than Gasly and Alex Albon throughout 2019 and 2020. More recently, Red Bull has dropped Sergio Perez for Liam Lawson after the Mexican struggled for form.

READ MORE: Sergio Perez’s Red Bull record compared to Max Verstappen’s vanquished teammates

Meija, a journalist for Formula Latina, said Gasly feels he was a clear second driver at Red Bull up against Verstappen.

He said: “I spoke to Gasly in Abu Dhabi about Checo’s situation. I asked if it was impossible to be Verstappen’s teammate.

“He said, I need hours to talk about this already, and I focus more on when you’re in the team. You need the team to do everything for you.

“From the side of the garage with you, they give 101, 102%. What they give from there, they take from you, and he felt he was served second at Red Bull as Max’s teammate. Red Bull has always centered around one main figure.”

Gasly was much slower than Verstappen and even finished a lap down on his teammate at the Austrian Grand Prix in 2019.

It can be mentally taxing being Verstappen’s teammate, which Lawson will have to be wary of next season at Red Bull.

Liam Lawson needs to avoid being mentally affected by the pressure of being alongside Max Verstappen

Lawson has been quick during his brief run in Formula 1 so far but wasn’t significantly quicker than his RB teammate, Yuki Tsunoda.

The New Zealander is being thrown into the Red Bull seat very early in his career. Lawson has completed one less race than Albon when he first partnered with Verstappen.

Lawson will experience higher pressure in 2025 than he has before, as there is much more media attention on the front of the field.

He will also be under pressure from other drivers in the Red Bull programme, such as Tsunoda and Isack Hadjar, who may be stepping in at RB.

Hadjar had a successful junior career and finished second in the Formula 2 championship behind 2025 Sauber driver Gabriel Bortoleto. He is likely to join RB as he is the lead driver in the Red Bull junior team and has already driven in multiple FP1 sessions.