Ocon: Renault F1 engine gains mean Alpine now not "shy of anybody"

In the early stages of the race Ocon battled with team-mate Fernando Alonso, and he eventually finished sixth after the Spaniard retired with a loss of drive.

At some stages of the race he also fought with other cars, notably the McLaren of Lando Norris in the closing laps of the race, with his sixth place lifting Alpine up to fourth in the early F1 world constructors’ standings.

Ocon made it clear that Renault has made a step with its revised power unit which has helped him to fight with rivals, after the French cars missed out on straightline speed performance in 2021.

When asked by Autosport in Jeddah about the form of the power unit, Ocon said: “Good. I mean, we didn't have to be shy of anybody.

“As soon as I had the DRS open I could pass, I could overtake easily the Aston of Nico [Hulkenberg], Lando in the McLaren.

“Who else? I mean Fernando of course was there. I could compare to many different cars, and it was working well for us.”

Ocon beat George Russell to fifth on the grid in Jeddah, but he acknowledged that Mercedes is still ahead in the battle to be third-fastest team on race pace.

“[Russell] was faster than us,” said the Frenchman. “He was not pulling away as much as we thought, but he was he was still pulling away compared to us.

Esteban Ocon, Alpine A522, battles with Lando Norris, McLaren MCL36

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images

“So they still have a little bit of race pace advantage clearly and this is something we are going to be working on.

“I think it's been two very strong weekends for the team. Unfortunately it's a shame that Fernando didn't complete the race, because there was a double points finish for the team again. But we've been progressing.

“We've been faster than Bahrain, so that's