Franco Colapinto's disappointment after finishing last: "It's a very difficult car."

The Hermanos Rodríguez racetrack hosted the qualifying session for the Formula 1 Mexican Grand Prix, in which Colapinto finished in 20th position.

The Buenos Aires native made a mistake on his final attempt, which prevented him from improving his position on the starting grid.

However, the performance of the Alpine car was disappointing: his teammate Pierre Gasly started 18th, slightly beating the man from Pilar, despite completing one more chance.

The 22-year-old made his disappointment evident when speaking to the media, where he highlighted the difficulties he had in controlling the Enstone-based team's A525 car. "Q2 was impossible. I think we could have finished 16th or 17th, but it's a very difficult car. I hit a kerb like they all do, and the front tires went up in the air. I had no steering. We always have to look for that last thousandth of a second, and nothing... it just doesn't work," argued a very disappointed Colapinto, reflecting on the problems he had at the end of Q1.

Along these same lines, he elaborated on the car's problems and the mistake that prevented him from improving his time: "We have to improve for tomorrow and try to make it a better day. But today was very difficult. The car was very disconnected, lacked grip. A complicated day overall. I think we have to work for tomorrow, but it's also going to be difficult."

Unlike other race weekends, Franco Colapinto wasn't very optimistic about Sunday's race, although he emphasized that they will work to maximize the car's performance. "We'll see what happens, but... It's going to be difficult. It's a track and a weekend that aren't going well for us, like most. But we have to work to improve this Sunday," the Pilar native analyzed.

The Pilar native once again emphasized the serious problems with a car that suffers significantly from bumps in the asphalt. “It's a very tough car that loses all grip with any bump. It wasn't a good qualifying session. I struggled a lot today in FP3 as well. And now, it wasn't a good qualifying session either. Let's work for tomorrow and hope for a better race,” he concluded in his comments to the accredited press.

In the first outing at the Qulay, Colapinto set a faster time than Gasly. The Pilar native clocked a lap of 1:18.392, while the Frenchman did the same with a time of 1:18.831. Both Alpine drivers immediately pitted for tire changes and their second set of new soft tires.

On his second outing, the positions were reversed. Pierre stopped the clock at 1:17.630, beating Franco (1:17.670) by 0.040 seconds. However, the two competitors from the French team remained at the back of the grid.

For the final run in Q1, both Alpines again fitted a fresh set of red tires. However, Colapinto made a mistake and couldn't improve his time: he was too aggressive on the entry into Turn 3, hit the kerb, and the car jumped . Although the Argentine managed to control the car, he lost a lot of time and slowed his pace. Gasly closed the lap with a time of 1:17.546 and finished in 18th place.

It's worth remembering that Colapinto had finished 19th in FP3, just ahead of Fernando Alonso's Aston Martin. The Argentine's best time was 1:18.581 , which was just 0.169 seconds slower than his teammate Pierre Gasly's, who placed 18th. This was the first session of the weekend in which the Frenchman outperformed the Pilar native, who dominated the internal battle at Alpine on Friday.