Throwback to When Pressure Burdened Young Esteban Ocon Into Almost Quitting His F1 Dream

Esteban Ocon’s journey into Formula 1 was not the easiest by any stretch of the imagination. The Frenchman came from humble beginnings and was brimmed with natural talent. Despite this and the many sacrifices his family made for him, the road to the pinnacle of motorsport often left him demoralized.

A junior career in single-seater racing has never been cheap. Hence, it is often those drivers who have an affluent family who are able to showcase their talents and rise up the ranks. Ocon was not one of them. Rather, he was the son of middle-class parents, who made ends meet by co-running a garage.

Ocon’s father was a mechanic, and his mother helped her husband out. But when push came to shove, and funding was required to keep the #31 driver’s career alive, they sold the garage and their house.

Ocon revealed on the High-Performance podcast, “There were only the two of them and they stopped doing that. They sold the garage, sold the house.”

As he revealed, even though he beat Max Verstappen to the Formula 3 crown, it was the Dutchman who got a seat in Formula 1. He admits that this decision broke his spirits like he had never experienced before.

The Frenchman’s formative years building up to his F1 career always forced him to fight – for his career and dreams. Naturally, that mentality has not left him once he made it into F1. Hence, on more than one occasion, Ocon has been involved in incidents when he’s just stepped over the line while battling hard, even if it is a teammate.

The 2024 Monaco GP is the latest example. On lap one of the race, the #31 driver tried to pull off a virtually impossible move down the inside at Portier on his Alpine teammate Pierre Gasly.

This led to the pair making contact. Consequently, there was enough damage on the floor of Ocon’s car that left him no choice but to retire. Meanwhile, Gasly went on to score the first points of the season for Alpine.

Esteban Ocon calls out the abuse he got after his Monaco GP incident

In the aftermath of Ocon’s crash, his boss, Bruno Famin, had a few strong words for him. Famin told French TV that Ocon would have to face the consequences for his error and that the team would have to make a tough decision very soon.

But this internal admonishment was not the end of it for the Frenchman. In the days after the race, Ocon faced a lot of flak from fans on social media. Many were reportedly speculating about Alpine sacking him mid-season.

But he came out with a statement recently on his official social media accounts, calling out all the abuse. Ocon wrote, “The misinformed statements and gross distortions that I have seen online in recent days about my ability to work with a team have been inaccurate, hurtful, and damaging.”

With the Canadian GP up next, Esteban Ocon would be eager to make amends with Alpine and score points for the second time this season.