Damon Hill hails £100k-a-week F1 driver who is ‘driving to the maximum’ right now

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Formula 1 legend Damon Hill has admitted he’s been overlooking Alpine driver Esteban Ocon after his fantastic drive at the Las Vegas Grand Prix.

Hill was speaking on the F1 Nation Podcast in the aftermath of a superb race last weekend.

It was a weekend of comebacks with many driver’s performances in qualifying not reflective of where they finished the race.

The two Williams drivers both started in the top six on Saturday night but ended up outside of the points.

Then there was the chaos that occurred at turn one saw several drivers fall to the back of the grid and have to work their way back into the points.

Sergio Perez’s recovery drive to third and Carlos Sainz reaching sixth were both very impressive.

However, two drivers started in the bottom five and ended up finishing in the top five.

Lance Stroll was superb for Aston Martin making up 14 positions, but it was Esteban Ocon that Damon Hill wanted to praise for his drive in Las Vegas.

The £100k-a-week driver stayed calm under pressure and avoided the carnage around him to finish fourth.

He extracted every bit of pace out of his car and earned one of his best results in Formula 1 as a result.

Hill praises Ocon after Las Vegas drive

Speaking about the Frenchman, Hill said: “It’s so easy to overlook the drivers who are battling out in the midfield and I was trying to think, if he was a driver who was at the front, how would I think of him.

“My conclusion was everyone in F1 is driving to the maximum and they sometimes don’t get recognition for it because they’re not the people on the podium.

“And we have just done the right thing by applauding Esteban Ocon for his performance and also Pierre Gasly who also did a good job, but you were talking about the Alpine team.”

As Hill suggests, it would be interesting to see Ocon in an even stronger team based on his performance in Las Vegas.

Alpine is a works team as the only Renault power unit user on the grid but doesn’t have the same budget as the likes of Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari.

The French team has potential and two very strong drivers, they just need Renault to produce a power unit that more closely matches the front runners.