To think that fellow French racers Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly would have a feud, might be unthinkable. They have been friends since their junior racing days until an incident occurred at the Bridgestone Cup finale in 2009. During the race, Gasly attacked Ocon’s third place and the two collided. Ever since there has been some bad blood between the two Normandy-born racers. Despite them being teammates now, the relationship has not smoothened over. However, Gasly recently confirmed he copied some moves from Ocon to help his 2024 campaign.

In the current season, Alpine has faced several difficulties that have held the team back from catching up with McLaren. Among the two recruits of the French squad, Pierre Gasly has had the worst to deal with. When he walked into the British GP weekend, the 28-year-old struggled with the set-up of his A524. Now, Alpine is running two different set-ups on the cars of their two drivers. Gasly decided to take a few pointers from his teammate since the mapping he had done was clearly not working.

The 28-year-old buried the hatchet and sought help from the teammate he seemed to have an ongoing feud with. “There were a couple of things that didn’t make sense with the balance of the car at the beginning of the year. So I asked to try the set-up used on the other side of the pit [Ocon’s] and we immediately went faster. It was something related to the software, difficult to pinpoint,” Gasly told AS, detailing how he fixed the things that were wrong with his set-up.

Now that Gasly has admitted to taking help from Ocon, he might soon get some promising results after that disappointing DNF in Silverstone. But while the Frenchman might have had some help from his countryman and colleague, they are still far from friends. So, what happened at the 2009 race that drove a rift in the friendship between Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon?

Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon fell apart over a podium finish

When Gasly and Ocon met for the first time, it was because the former’s father bought a kart from Esteban’s brother. The two used to drive on the same race track in Normandy and spent a lot of time together. However, the competitors clashed at the 2009 Bridgestone Cup where Gasly’s maneuver for a podium led to his collision with Esteban Ocon. Eventually, both of them once again encountered each other as Formula 1 drivers and had some on-track incidents that led to the worsening of their relationship.

The ugly dynamic between the two Frenchmen once compelled Ocon to say, “I don’t think we will ever be best friends but that doesn’t matter really as long as the atmosphere is great inside the team.”

At this year’s Monaco GP, Gasly and Ocon had contact at the very first lap of the race at the historic Circuit de Monaco. The resultant damage to Esteban’s Alpine was so severe that the Frenchman had to walk away from the race and he even incurred a time penalty which he had to serve at the Canadian GP which was up next.

Despite whatever equation Pierre Gasly now shares with Esteban Ocon, the two will not stay on the same team for much longer. Ocon is going to exit Alpine at the end of this year’s Championship. On the other hand, Gasly has renewed his deal with the Enstone outfit for multiple years up ahead.

Did Alpine make the right decision by re-signing Gasly and letting his teammate go even though the French squad has had a longer relationship with Esteban Ocon? Share your thoughts in the comments below.