Esteban Ocon has long been regarded as a driver with huge promise and the Frenchman is proving his mettle for Alpine. Continuing his excellent form from last season, he is outperforming his world champion teammate, Fernando Alonso. Ocon has finished five out of the seven races in points, a stat that has been hampered by the penalty Ocon received in Monaco.

The Frenchman crossed the line at P9, but because of a five-second penalty, was demoted to P12. The penalty resulted from a coming together with the charging Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton. During an overtaking maneuver, Ocon and Hamilton made contact which damaged the left front wing of the world champion, an incident the stewards deemed worthy of a five-second penalty.

After Ocon learned of his demotion to P12, he said, “It’s a joke guys. It is a joke, they can’t take the result away like that. This is favoritism! Crash into me and you get the penalty. What is this? We can’t see in the mirrors here.”

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And after being asked to calm down, Ocon continued, “You know it’s all that effort you know we put in the weekend to get to the f**king..”

It was a frustrating aspect for Ocon and Alpine as they were denied their points counting toward the championship. And especially for Alpine, as the points from Alonso and Ocon would’ve kept them above Alfa Romeo at 5th in the constructors’ standings.

Esteban Ocon, the dark horse of Alpine

Following a lot of outrage after the announcement of his multi-year contract with Alpine, Ocon has silenced his critics. The Frenchman has been the better of the two Alpine drivers.

If it weren’t for the penalty in Monaco, Ocon would’ve finished in points again. The French driver has a total of 30 points so far, far more than the 10 points of Alonso after the Monaco Grand Prix.

It will be interesting to see whether Ocon will be able to continue to put up these performances and leave his world champion teammate behind at the end of the season.

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