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Gasly had to persuade Red Bull to allow ROC appearance

Gasly had to persuade Red Bull to allow ROC appearance

19-01-2019 17:35
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Jake Williams-Smith

Red Bull's Pierre Gasly had to persuade the team to allow him to participate at the 2019 Race of Champions event in Mexico. The Frenchman will be representing Team France at the event alongside Loic Duval.

Speaking to media ahead of the event, Gasly revealed his participation in the weekend's action wasn't straight forward. The 22-year-old had to convince his Red Bull bosses to let him appear at the event.

“I’ve been watching the Race Of Champions since I was a kid so it’s a great pleasure to be here this weekend,” he said.

“I’m a racer and I just like to race whatever kind of car I can get my hands on. So when I saw I had the opportunity to race for Team France, of course I wanted to do it.

“I had to do a bit of negotiating with my team bosses, but in the end they let me race. This is a really cool event with an amazing atmosphere, and it’s great to have the chance to race in a more relaxed atmosphere than usual and catch up with all the different drivers from different series around the world.”

Possible concern over Gasly's participation may have arisen from Pascal Wehrlein's experience at the ROC event in 2017. The German suffered a crash and damaged his neck. The incident caused Wehrlein to miss the opening two rounds of the 2017 season where he was replaced at Sauber by Antonio Giovinazzi.