Gasly jokes Marko prepared him for any F1 pressure

Pierre Gasly has joked that dealing with Helmut Marko when he was in the Red Bull ranks has prepared him for any pressure he might encounter in Formula 1.

Speaking ahead of the Brazilian Grand Prix, the Alpine driver was asked about the passionate support surrounding teammate Franco Colapinto and whether that atmosphere affected him too.

The Brazilian Grand Prix is the closest thing to a home race for his Argentine teammate Colapinto.

Gasly responded with a cheeky reference to his experience of working under Red Bull’s influential former motorsport adviser.

“You know what? Once you deal with Helmut Marko, anything else is no pressure,” he said.

“I mean, I know what I gotta do as my job and I focus on that and I think generally it's the beauty of F1 and I get actually quite good energy in these type of moments.”

Gasly progressed through Red Bull's driver program and raced for both its junior and senior teams before joining Alpine.

The Frenchman briefly drove for the senior Red Bull team in 2019 before he was demoted back to the sister team.

GASLY TAKES RESPONSIBILITY FOR MEXICO PENALTY

Colapinto and Gasly finished eighth and 10th on the road in Mexico on Sunday.

But they dropped to 15th and 17th respectively following yellow flag infringements at the Mexican Grand Prix after the crash involving Oscar Piastri and Arvid Lindblad.

Speaking about the penalty, Gasly said: "Ultimately, I didn't slow down enough, so I take full responsibility for the penalty."

"I think the circumstances of it wasn't very easy because the crash happened right in front of us."

"So I think the double yellow was right as I was at the apex of Turn One, and I didn't really go back on throttle, which makes me slow down and obviously to me took some actions."

"Unfortunately it was not enough for the stewards to be comfortable with it."

Gasly was handed a stop/go penalty for failing to slow, which was converted into a 30-second time penalty, and handed two penalty points on his superlicence as he fell from ninth to 17th in the final results.

Colapinto was handed a 10-second penalty and one penalty point as he dropped from seventh to 15th — with Alpine's points haul wiped out.

EARLY MORNING DRUG TEST

Gasly also revealed that he was subject to a random doping test ahead of the Sao Paulo Grand Prix weekend.

F1 drivers are, like other professional athletes, subject to the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) anti-doping rules, with the FIA long complying with WADA's codes.

This involves random drug tests through the year, including during and even before grand prix weekends.

Any missed test is treated as a failure, as happened with Manchester United footballer Rio Ferdinand in 2003, who was then banned from playing for eight months and fined £50,000 GBP.

However, Gasly did not miss his test, as he revealed the test administrators woke him up at 6am on Thursday morning.

Asked if he was optimistic for Interlagos, given he has two podiums at the venue, Gasly indicated he was, as he revealed the drug test.

"You just made my day," he began to tell media, including RacingNews365.

"I got woken up at 06:00 for a doping test this morning, so I'm not in the best mood."

"It was a bad night, but I love this place."

"It's the only track where I've had two F1 podiums, my first in 2019 and then in 2024 in the rain."

"And Sunday looks like it is going to rain, so I am very excited."

GASLY REFLECTS ON MEXICO CITY GP MISTAKE

It was a bittersweet race for Gasly at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez last Sunday.

The Alpine driver took the chequered flag in 10th, being then provisionally bumped up to ninth following Oscar Piastri’s penalty.

However, a yellow flag infringement during the race meant the stewards imposed a 30-second time penalty on the Frenchman including two penalty points on his license.