Lapped Gasly needs a ‘Control-Alt-Delete’ – Horner

2019 Austrian Grand Prix

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Red Bull team principal Christian Horner says Pierre Gasly’s troubled start to his first season at the team is being more difficult by Max Verstappen’s form.

Verstappen lapped Gasly on his way victory at the Red Bull Ring last weekend. Horner said the team’s new driver needs a reset following his recent struggles.

“Piere’s having a tough time at the moment,” said Horner. “We’re doing our very best to support him.

“I think he just needs a reset. We know what he is capable of. I think we just somehow have got to go ‘Control-Alt-Delete’ in his head and start again.”

Gasly is suffering in comparison to his team mate, Horner believes. “He’s a quick driver. The problem he’s got is obviously Max is delivering every week and that puts more pressure obviously on him to performance.

“But we’re sticking by him, we still believe in him and we’ll give him all the support that we can to try and nurture the talent that we know he has.”

Horner confirmed Gasly’s car did not have a technical problem during the race but said the team is not looking at replacing him at the moment.

“There’s no intention to change Pierre. He’s our driver, we’re going to work with him, we’re going to try to obviously get the best out of him.”

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108 comments on “Lapped Gasly needs a ‘Control-Alt-Delete’ – Horner”

  1. I thought Horner/Marko would use Del key for Gasly already.

    1. Matteo (@m-bagattini)
      2nd July 2019, 8:46

      Control+Alt+Sell

    2. Luke S (@joeypropane)
      2nd July 2019, 10:11

      “Press F5 to refresh driver line-up”

      1. just a ‘delete’ will do.

    3. ctrl-Z?

      1. No, because Gasly can’t cut it.

        1. That would be Ctrl-X.

          Ctrl-Z is “reverse/undo” (presumably, to undo the promotion).

    4. Shift + delete ;)

  2. Not what we’ve come to expect from Red Bull, is it a genuine change of attitude or just saying whatever they can to get what little they can out of him before they do get rid of him?

    1. @skipgamer I disagree, this is exactly what to expect from Red Bull. There is no Red Bull or Toro Rosso driver that got at least 1 full season (often more) to prove himself.

      1. I meant to say that there is no Red Bull or STR-driver that didn’t got a full season or more to prove himself.

      2. Dutchguy (@justarandomdutchguy)
        2nd July 2019, 10:49

        Robert Doornbos
        3 races, 2006

        1. @justarandomdutchguy You got me there.

          1. @justarandomdutchguy and @Matthias, whilst statistically accurate that he only got 3 races, i don’t think it’s a fair comparison.

            As I recall, Robert was test and reserve driver and was only promoted to race driver as a stop-gap between Klien and the signing of Webber.

            He wasn’t promoted to have a chance at a race seat. He was fulfilling his role as reserve driver.

            I may be proven to be wrong with this though.

          2. Dutchguy (@justarandomdutchguy)
            2nd July 2019, 11:10

            Finally all that useless knowledge is good for something

          3. @justarandomdutchguy, never useless! Have You not seen Slumdog Millionaire?!

    2. there’s no one else in the pipeline, so they are kind of stuck with Gasly. RedBull doesn’t bring drivers from other teams, all they use is from STR or their academy, and at the moment no one is worth promoting (Ticktum has been let go recently). I honestly don’t think bringing Kviat or Albon as teammate to Max will do them any good, as they would be trashed the same way Gasly is.

      If I were RedBull I’d try to grab Russel, as Mercedes don’t really need him, they have Ocon (or even Werhlein) for a possible replacement for Bottas.

      1. @gechichan Promoting Verstappen to Toro Rosso first and then Red Bull was a blessing and a curse. They cut ties with Vergne, demoted Kvyat and had to let Sainz go eventually. No there is no-one left to fill the seats. Albon is doing great but I fear he will pull a ‘Gasly’ when promoted too soon.

        1. Im pretty sure they could get all those back if they wanted. The only one they want back is Ricciardo and even he couldnt match Verstappen.

          1. Vergne all but confirmed that he didn’t want to get back after winning FE @rethla.

          2. @bascb
            Gasly will probably say that aswell ;)

          3. Ah, but will he get offered to come back though @rethla.

      2. If I were RedBull I’d try to grab Russel

        I totally agree @gechichan

        1. @nullapax That would be a good one indeed! The only driver to dominate his teammate like Verstappen is doing ;). I think Russell is doing well atm.

      3. Kvyat could do it.

        1. Kvyat had some top qualis in the RBR past indeed.
          It seems his wild years are over , so a good option.

      4. Everyone seems to come at this like RB have options to fill the seat if they get rid of Gasly.
        Grab Russell people say. But no-one has bothered to ask if Russell would actually want the seat. I personally think it would be monumentally silly to go there. That second seat at RB is a poison that once swallowed will quickly kill your career.

        The only drivers that I can see that would want that seat are the drivers at the last chance saloon. Like Hulkenburg and Perez. They potentially believe they have the skill to match it with Max and realise that this will likely be the only chance they get at a top 3 team.

        For all the younger guys like Norris and Russell, it is a really low percentage move with way more risk than any possible reward.

        1. steve (@fandangopants)
          2nd July 2019, 11:59

          Alonso? Maybe he could be tempted back now RB are on the rise and Honda have a race-winning engine. Would be good to see him vs Verstappen in the same team.

          1. He burned all his bridges with Honda ( GP2 engine) and with RBR.
            The only team that act if they want him is McLaren. But they have a strong pairing already.
            So Alonso can retire for F1.

        2. @mickharrold Good point. Trouble is that RB don’t want those older gentlemen for their drinks image so it’s a dilemma, and why they’re stuck with Gasly so hence the pretend ‘arm around the shoulder’.

          Personally I would ask Alonso even if he’s also out of the marketing age group. They would grab front pages on dailys all over the world with that and he would bag a whole heap of points.

        3. Getting Hulkenberg would not only mean getting a quick driver with experience with a lot of different teams (thus helping with car development), it would also be a way of getting back at Reanult for stealing Ricciardo =)

    3. In other sports, like football, when they say they have full trust in the trainer it means he’s about to be sacked. In the case of Gasly I think its a little different because Redbull doesnt want two superstar drivers. If we think back to Alonso and Hamilton or Lewis and Rosberg that often put the team in a difficult positions because both drivers are fighting for the win. For this year Redbull will be the 3rd team in the constructors championship regardless of the drivers so what good would replacing Gasly do? Verstappen is probably happy to be the clear no.1 driver without competition from the other side of the garage.

  3. It was kind of obvious when they signed Pierre that his confidence was in for a beating in 2019.

    Gasly was shining against Hartley, a driver who hadn’t raced in open wheel categories in ages, and was never really up to the F1 mark to begin with. Gasly went from a confidence boosting environment of racing the worst teammate on the grid, to a confidence crushing environment of driving against the best driver on the grid.

    So, the fact that he’s lagging his teammate comes as no surprise, but the fact that he’s lagging most midfield drivers in superior machinery, shows that his time at Red Bull is limited. I reckon Red Bull will give him until a couple of races after the summer break. If he hasn’t improved dramatically by the time they get to Singapore, I’d expect an announcement of Kvyat returning to the Red Bull squad.

    No need for a Ctrl-Alt-Del then… just a simple drag and drop to the bin hold suffice.

    1. @todfod I’m not buying that Gasly is this bad, last year he was pretty decent. Looking at the onboards Verstappen is able to put the power down sooner than Gasly. I think the car is not suited for his style and his confidence is plummeting.

      1. @matthijs
        I concur. His morale is extremely low at the moment. But from the team’s perspective, the Austrian GP was a very nice opportunity for them to reduce to gap to Ferrari in the WCC. Earlier this year, it was beyond anybody’s imagination that Red Bull Honda could fight for second place in the WCC but Max’s consistency and Ferrari’s misfiring performance so far have kept me wondering if that is indeed possible. Verstappen’s win has only increased the probability of that happening. Gasly has scored just 43 to Max’s 126. Red Bull trail Ferrari by 59 points which would be very less if Gasly was finishing higher up–something that was very much possible with the car he is in. It would be a shame to see a driver replaced/demoted in the middle of the season but thats all fair in competition.

      2. Being able to work well with different cars is also what makes you a good driver. If he can’t adapt to the Red Bull and is struggling to finish in front of midfield teams, he’s just not good enough. Before the season is over Kvyat or Albon will be in that car.

        1. There is a difference between ‘not good enough’ and being lapped by your teammate. Gasly is not driving at his best even if his best is still not good enough.

        2. yeah exactly like kimi long time ago, ricciardo and alsonso who could not adapt themselves to their new cars

          1. Did they ever lose over a second per lap to their team mate without having any technical problems?

          2. ???

            When have Ricciardo and Alonso struggled to adapt to new cars?

      3. @matthijs

        There’s no denying that the car it more suited to Max’s style as he’s been with the team for ages, but still there’s no excuse for being anywhere between 0.6 to 0.8 seconds down on your teammate in every qualifying session. There’s no excuse for being lapped by your teammate under normal racing conditions either.

        Maybe Gasly just isn’t versatile enough to adapt to a car that requires driving style adjustments. Regardless, it doesn’t reflect well on his ability as a driver.

        1. I mean the car won the Austrian GP despite a horrible start, that is the car to adept to and if you cant you aint good enough.

          1. @rethla, there is the small caveat that, according to Auto Motor und Sport, when Verstappen crashed during the practise sessions, as the team did not have enough of the new upgraded parts that they had brought to Austria. They therefore simply stripped the upgraded parts off Gasly’s car and fitted them to Verstappen’s car, with Gasly’s car then having the older specification parts fitted to it instead.

            It does seem to suggest that there is potentially a difference in the way in which the cars are prepared and the level of technical support which is given to the two drivers that could go some way to explaining part of the gap. That said, I do agree with the sentiment of some other posters that Gasly is potentially a bit of a weak driver to begin with, given his form in lower series.

          2. Smart move by RB. Whatever specc Gasly is running it should still cater to the same drivestyle and its no excuse to being lapped.

        2. @todfod I never thought Gasly was an unique talent in the junior classes and I never thought he would be able to beat Verstappen. I just feel that the huge difference between the two Red Bull drivers is not just down to sheer ability alone. Anyway, Gasly’s days are numbered.

    2. Gasly was shining against Hartley, a driver who hadn’t raced in open wheel categories in ages, and was never really up to the F1 mark to begin with.

      I don’t really agree with this assessment. Hartley had done really well in wec with porsche being 2017 lemans winner and champion in 2017 and 2015. He had a lot of positive press and mark webber’s appraisals behind him going into f1.

    3. But what would they gain from such a move? They won’t get to number 2 in the championship anyway, and instead will face the potential risk of grabbing negative headlines about poor treatment of their drivers (again). When Kvyat was replaced with Verstappen, at least they were moving a real star in the making to the top. Replacing Gasly with Kvyat or Albon will only slightly increase their point tally in the best case scenario. And we all know how a demoted and demoralized driver performs back in the lower team, so that move will potentially harm Toro Rosso and give no substantial gain to Red Bull. Why bother? As I see it, they are likely to keep Gasly till the end of the season and put either Kvyat or Albon (depending on who performs better and consistently all year long) in Red Bull for the next year.

  4. Oh boy, if Premier league statements on players and managers are anything to go by, it means he’ll get the boot soon enough

    1. @tango This comment aged well…

  5. If they had anyone more promising in STR, they would have exchanged them already, like they did for Max V.

    They don’t, so now they are all supportive and nice.

    1. Chris (@chrisgalaz)
      2nd July 2019, 10:06

      well kvyat only got demoted because they wanted max in rb not because he was horrible…

      1. Well…

        1. Kvyat was doing far far better job at red bull than gasly is doing now. Kvyat came ahead of ricciardo in points in 2015 in his second season in f1 and would have been close in 2016 as well. Of course verstappen is better than kvyat but kvyat was much closer to ricciardo (or verstappen) than gasly could even dream of. Red bull needed verstappen in the red bull because otherwise they might have even lost him. The kvyat’s crashes were just convenient excuse to swap the drivers and while kvyat’s pace was not really setting the world on fire he was still doing respectable job

          1. Indeed. If memory serves well, Kvyat even got the podium right before he got demoted.

      2. Daniel Cronise
        2nd July 2019, 20:18

        Kyvat might be better now that he has matured. His previous experience with RBR wasn’t great, but I was surprised to find out that he scored more points than Danny Ric in 2015.

        I’m still hopeful for Gasly, probably cause I like to root for underdogs. Kyvat is also an underdog, so I guess I’ll be happy either way..lol

        As said before, we’ve got examples of champion drivers that weren’t very adaptable.

  6. Electroball76
    2nd July 2019, 9:05

    Have they run a malware scan?
    Or, have they tried turning it off and then back on again?

  7. Lee H (@stopitrawr)
    2nd July 2019, 9:08

    To all of the people who insistent I was an idiot for saying that Gasly would not improve, and that he just needs to find his feet at RBR.

    Come get your kid.

    Being lapped by your sister car, being passed on track on the way, and only not losing out to both McLarens because one of them had a broken car is not a drive indicative of a RBR calibre driver.

    Horner is being polite here. Gasly is gone. If not now, then by next season. Terrible doesn’t come close to describing Gasly this weekend. Pathetic does.

    Messed up Q3 when it counted.

    Took a race winning car and gets lapped. Unable to even challenge Norris and struggled to even overtake Kimi when his tyres were shot.

  8. replacing Gasly would only be sensible if you want to evaluate their performance for next year (and give him a head start for getting familiair with the team). Big question then is: who should RB replace Gasly with?
    – Kvyat: available, is performing better then his last stint with TR/RB but I don’t think he will be a choice for the longer term at RB.
    – Albon: available, but high risk. Don’t think he’ll perform better then Gasly at the moment
    – Someone outside of current F1 like Ocon, Wehrlein, Vergne?

    Maybe they’ll stick with Gasly for now, while looking for another driver for 2020.

    1. @mcbosch

      Wehrlein makes a really solid candidate. He was quite a decent driver and really strong on the days he clicked. He’s no longer associated with Mercedes, which would make him an easy option to sign.

      Ocon… I just can’t see Ocon and Max in the same team.

      Vergne, I really liked the guy, but he’s been racing those slow, electric tin cans for way too long.

    2. Why not a solid and experienced driver like Hulkenberg? Renault are reported to look beyond the Hulk as his contract is running out at the end of this season and the French outfit are said to be wanting a French driver.

      So, why not swap Hulkenberg for Gasly?

      Nico would jump at the opportunity to finally fight for podiums and Gasly get’s his hard reset and a real opportunity to prove he is still quick, rather than being demoted and damaging his psyche even more.

    3. Don’t forget Vandoorne, i really think he has potential

    4. Don’t think Ocon would be a good match to Verstappen either (personality wise). Can’t see Vandoorne in the RedBull. Decent driver and overall likeable guy, but underperformed in the McLaren and under contract with Mercedes (like Ocon). A swap with Hulkenberg in the summer is very unlikely, plus I think Renault would rather have Ocon for the rest of the season.

  9. Isn’t there any example, of Red Bull taking a driver from outside their own ranks???

    1. @jens

      They were ready to take Norris on, but Mclaren refused.

      1. And for a good reason Mclaren turned down to handover Norris to RBR.

    2. @jens Before Vettel they did with Coulthard and Webber, but not recently no.

      1. Verstappen was from outside their ranks.

        1. Not really, Verstappen became a Red Bull junior driver only months after he graduated from karts.

  10. I have stuck up for Gasly (mostly) but being lapped by your team mate with no mechanical, or indeed any, excuse is downright shameful.

    Swap one of the Torro Rosso guys with him. I don’t care which. If they perform as badly then I will cut Ghastly some slack again.

    1. I will cut Ghastly some slack again.

      @nullapax
      Don’t know if that was intentional. But ‘Ghastly’ does seem like an apt nickname for Pierre.

      1. @todfod oh it was intentional allright – and I intend using so much that everyone on here will get sick of seeing it ;)

    2. @nullapax Does having a car with components a spec down on one’s team-mate, purely because of your team-mate’s bad driving, not count as an excuse? (I don’t think Pierre used it, and I have no idea if it even explains half the gap, but it’s not nothing).

  11. Makes me wonder how good last year’s TR actually was!

  12. tony mansell
    2nd July 2019, 10:06

    Nominative determinism not withstanding he doesn’t look the real deal. If you see how Lando has immediately got on the pace and matched & even eclipsed Sainz you realise how far away he is. Yes Max is a once in a generation driver and RBR are very lucky to still have him but he’s shown nothing, even Kvyat showed flashes of raw pace. This guy just looks raw. Bin time.

    1. Yes Max is a once in a generation driver and RBR are very lucky to still have him but he’s shown nothing,

      i guess the “he” in this sentence means Gasly?

      1. tony mansell
        2nd July 2019, 14:12

        The ‘he’ is who the article is about? God love a grammar queen cos no one else does.

        Feel free to add something constructive rather than correcting grammar on throw away posts

        1. That was constructive

          1. tony mansell
            2nd July 2019, 17:23

            So this is forum for discussing grammar is it Gabriel?

            I just noticed the anagram of his name, ha, figures

          2. Theres only one post in here thats so bad it was brought up otherwise we mostly discuss F1.

  13. I wonder if Christian sees the irony in him roasting Toto for not investing in a team for the junior Mercedes drivers now that they’ve blown their load of young drivers, arguably wasting many of them before they were ready.

  14. Next step after Cntrl+Alt+Del: pulling the plug.

  15. I honestly don’t understand why they have been looking only at the Red Bull pool. He has never been considered as an outstanding once in a generation talent, so why grant him such a hugely demanding seat so early in his career? It can hardly be surprising to Red Bull that Gasly is not one of the best of the sport yet, right?

    I hink it’s a shame for the sport as well. With only 6 competitive seats available, why this sudden eagerness by the top teams to only have the youngest and inexperienced? I think Mercedes’ decision to hire Bottas instead of Ocon or Wherlein was sensible and has gained them a lot of points over the years. Why didn’t red Bull consider doing the same and spend some more to hire Hulkenberg, Perez or even Alonso, Raikkonen? Even Button or Massa would have been a guarantee of decent points and consistency right?

    1. @stijner “why grant him such a hugely demanding seat so early in his career?”

      Because Red Bull’s other options were worse. They aren’t in a position to admit their driver development scheme is drying up because otherwise there’s no value in them keeping Toro Rosso (they can pass off Verstappen as theirs because he switched to them before signing his first F1 contract. Six days before), so they can’t pick up drivers opportunistically. All they can do is hope Patricio O’Ward does well enough in GP2 to allow a cascade where he goes to Toro Rosso and Alexander Albon takes the Red Bull.

      Or, you know, actually help Pierre Gasly make the most of his seat. But if Red Bull could do that, they’d probably have had a choice of drivers at this juncture.

  16. I’d probably install a KMag upgrade in that car.

  17. The other thing that stood out to me was that if not for Sainz getting front wing damage towards the end of the race Gasly might have lost out to a McLaren that started at the back of the grid. He really is getting nowhere near the potential of that Red Bull, regardless of how good Verstappen is.

  18. Agreed, but I believe that’s where experience comes into play.

    Today, thanks to simulator and all modern technologies, cars are “decently setup” by the team before coming to a track (while private testing is extremely limited). We expect young driver to be competitive from the beginning, since they don’t need to learn and work that much with the team to get the car right. But this is in my opinion only true if the car suit sufficiently well the driver style. When not, the guy is not competitive, and probably has a lot of trouble to manage those freaking tires… They find themselves in limbo: no testing, team have lost the habit to mentor them a log time ago and no time is give to them, pressure rise immediately.

    Gasly may not be Senna, but he cannot be that bad.

    1. Gasly may not be Senna, but he cannot be that bad.

      agreed, but as dar as your other remarks go:
      Testing can be done in the simulator. The level of realism these days is extremely high.
      And Horner already said somewhat earlier they are coaching him.
      So, i seems he is very insecure and looking at his “passing” skills he does not seem to recognize the chances on track.

      1. @erikje 0 Realism is high – if you are the sort of driver who processes the world the way the simulator does. Not everyone is.

        In-team coaching only helps if inherent mistakes the team is making are not part of the problem – and in Gasly’s case, I think they are. In that situation, the coaching needs to come from somewhere other than one of the components of the problem.

  19. RBR are a team consist of a young gun and an experienced supporter. So, dropping Gasly for a driver that can match Max is not their way. So I’m not sure if they have a suitable option for now in their inventory. And if you consider an external source, again there is not much option in current environment. Kimi would be useless, Alonso overqualified, so on.
    The only option remaining, I think Bottas. If he turns into last year specs at some point, Russel or Ocon may be involved in Merc seat fight. At that time, best option would be RBR for Bottas, too.

    1. You are saying that after multiple years of them having the best lineup on the grid?

      1. Coulthard?-Klien??, Coulthard?-Webber?, Webber?-Vettel, Vettel-Ricciardo?, Ricciardo?-Kvyat??, Ricciardo?-Verstappen

        Sorry bu I don’t see the best lineup on the grid here.

  20. RocketTankski
    2nd July 2019, 11:41

    Ticktum fell out of favour fast. It was only a few months ago that RB wanted to change the superlicence rules to get him in a car?

    1. They where as desperate back then as now.

    2. @RocketTankski They realised Daniel was going to have even fewer Superlicence points at the end of 2019 than the end of 2018, and less chance of the FIA bending the rules at all, let alone to accommodate Red Bull.

  21. DAllein (@)
    2nd July 2019, 13:17

    But we’re sticking by him, we still believe in him and we’ll give him all the support that we can

    In other words – he has 1-3 races left, depends on the mood, the moon and the wool. Nonsense? No way! RBR’s way.

  22. Yes, he indeed does.

  23. It has nothing to do with Verstappen being good this year.
    The least you’d expect for him is to always be in the 6th place. Saturdays and sundays.

    In his years with Fernando at Ferrari, Massa owned the spot. He even raced under the number 6.
    That means ‘worst of the best’.

    Gasly most of the time can’t get even that.
    So, no, Verstappen doesn’t matter, we should expect Gasly to be the worst of the best. More often than not, he isn’t, at least he is lucky enough to get beaten by a different guy every race, and so he can be the worst of the best at the standings, by meagre 13 points atm.

  24. Red Bull know ‘Control-Alt-Delete’ will create even more Gasly headlines. And ‘Control-Alt-Delete’, ‘Ctrl+Alt+Del’ is now all over Google news search with Gasly’s name next to it. Loads of stories! Not a place any F1 driver wants to be. I think Red Bull just want to know asap if he’s up for the job or not by cranking up the pressure even more. They want to know if he will sink or swim fast… not take time knowing. Very Red Bull way of doing things.

  25. Does he really?! Few weeks ago I commented that “I am not convinced yet about GAS” and some quite vocal and “openminded” (LOL) people here told me to not judge, although that this sentence is neither judgemental nor critical.

    Thank you Mr. Horner. Really nothing else to say there.

  26. Put Ocon in the seat!!!

    1. Will never happen, but it would be so entertaining to see Ocon and Max battle on and off the track.

  27. NeverElectric
    3rd July 2019, 3:50

    Maybe they should kick Gasly out and replace him with David Coulthard.
    Yeah.

    1. Or Geri Halliwell at this point.

  28. RB don’t have anyone to replace him with.

  29. When I press Ctrl+Alt+Del on my laptop it brings up the lock screen. When was the last time that combo of keys rebooted a PC? 200x? Clearly no one reading this is under 25.

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