Ocon 'Feeling Unwell' Misses Press Day In Abu Dhabi As Advised By His Doctors

Friday, 24 November 2023 at 00:00

Alpine's F1 driver Esteban Ocon was announced to miss the press day in Abu Dhabi due to feeling unwell.

Abu Dhabi Grand Prix is the last race of the 2023 season and comes just one week after the Las Vegas Grand Prix race, completing the final two-header this year.

These last two weeks of the season are particularly challenging for all F1 drivers and their teams as everybody has to adjust to completely different time zones, disrupting their circadian rhythms.

To put things in perspective, drivers flew from Sao Paulo, where they raced at 17:00 GMT, to Las Vegas, where they had to turn their sleeping schedule around to race at 6:00GMT.

Right after the race in Vegas, they had to fly an 18-hour long flight to Abu Dhabi, where they yet again had to adjust their sleeping schedule for the race that would take place at 13:00 GMT.

Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner mentioned everybody was "everybody's leaving Vegas slightly f****d" and called for changes to the schedule going into the next season.

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It is not clear whether all this might have an impact on the Alpine driver Esteban Ocon, but his team announced he would be part of Thursday Press Day. As quoted by gpblog.com, the team stated:

"Esteban has been feeling unwell this week and has been advised to rest by his doctors. Although his condition has improved as of this morning, he will miss this afternoon’s media duties at the circuit. We expect him to be back at the track as soon as possible."

Ocon's team hinted he will not miss the final Grand Prix weekend of the season. But even if he did, Alpine does not have too much to fight for as the team is stuck in sixth place in the Championship.

The French team is currently stuck in kind of a no man's land, lacking 153 points on Aston Martin in fifth place but with a comfortable gap of 92 points over Williams in seventh place.

Either way, both Ocon and Alpine will surely want to finish the 2023 season on a high with a great result. In what place do you see Ocon finishing the 2023 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix?