Esteban Ocon looks back on 2019 F1 Ronin "crying in a parking lot in Melbourne"[F1-Gate .com]

Esteban Ocon is one of F1’s Grand Prix winners and one of the most established young talents on the F1 grid. But he’s bottoming out in 2019.

Despite his solid track record in F1, Esteban Ocon has Lance Stroll (the son of then-new team owner Lauren Stroll) as Sergio Perez’s teammate at Racing Point. Due to the decision to hire him, he lost his F1 seat at the end of 2018.

As a contract driver for Mercedes managed by Toto Wolff, Esteban Ocon was assigned the role of reserve driver on the Mercedes F1 team and promised a comprehensive test program for 2019.

However, Esteban Ocon was hit hard in his first race in Melbourne that year.

“It was definitely hard and it was pretty deep mentally,” Esteban Ocon recalled in 2019 at Beyond th eGrid.

“I remember Australia. I got there for the first race of 2019. There should have been a pretty big test program.”

“I was supposed to drive quite a lot, but when I arrived in Australia I was told I wouldn’t drive for the next 6 months.”

Esteban Ocon pretended to be calm, but when he was alone, he fell into sadness.

“It was a pretty big blow. I remember leaving the truck in Melbourne, going to the rental car and crying in the parking lot.”

“Sure, it was pretty deep … sleeping wasn’t a big deal, but I remember that night. It wasn’t the best sleep.”

With the 2019 campaign unfolding, the dream of racing in the Mercedes F1 the following year was far away as the team committed to continuing the pair of Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton.

However, Toto Wolff, who manages Esteban Ocon, was also committed to finding an F1 seat at Esteban Ocon in 2020.

“I was very well taken care of by James Baures, Toto and Gwen Lagru in Mercedes. They were taking care of me and trying to find a solution,” recalled Esteban Ocon.

“Toto was very clear and said,’You’ll be driving in 2020.’ I said,’Toto, why are you so sure?’ He said,’Now I know. I was saying, “…”

“I didn’t want to believe him because I didn’t want to be disappointed, but when he talked about something, it actually happened quite a few times.”

“And that happened again. I wasn’t Mercedes in 2020, but I got a drive at Renault, and that was the beginning of something new to me.”

Esteban Ocon took second place with Renault in the penultimate round of the season at Sakir and took his first podium in F1. And last year, he won his first F1 victory at the Hungarian Grand Prix.