F1 star kills animal at Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix and speaks out on ‘sad’ incident | F1 | Sport

Alpine driver Pierre Gasly has spoken out after hitting a rabbit during practice at the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix. The 29-year-old impressed on Friday, finishing sixth fastest in FP1 and then improving to third in FP2.

However, his day was marred by an incident in the opening session. The 29-year-old was approaching Variante Alta chicane when the animal darted across the track and right into his path. Gasly was unable to avoid a collision and admitted afterwards that the worst had happened.

“Very sadly, I could not tell what it was, and it turned out it was a big rabbit just jumping across the track,” he explained. “I could not avoid it, so I had quite a big impact on the front wing, and unfortunately, that was it for the rabbit, which broke the front wing.”

Engineers had to work on the damaged wing afterwards, and Gasly added: “It was not ideal, but it was not the session we wanted, and it is quite unfortunate, as we always try to look after our parts.”

The incident overshadowed an otherwise excellent day for Gasly, who has just one top-10 finish this season. That came in Bahrain, where the one-time race winner was seventh, while he was 13th last time out in Miami.

“When such things happen, it is not great, but it was a very, very good Friday,” he added. “From the first lap, the car was in a much better place than Miami, and I’m glad we managed to answer some of the question marks we had.

“The car reacts the way I want, and I’m really able to be at the limit and push at the maximum, so it is a nice feeling, the performance is there. It is quite fair to say it’s probably been the best Friday so far this year.”

The performances would have been welcomed by Alpine, with the team in the spotlight this week after replacing driver Jack Doohan with Franco Colapinto. The Argentine laboured to 17th in FP1, before improving to 13th in the second hour.