By alley - Oct 3, 2017, 9:05 AM ET

Gasly would give up title shot for F1 chance

Pierre Gasly admits he would give up his chance of winning the Super Formula championship in order to race in Formula 1 for the rest of the season.

The Frenchman is just half a point adrift of championship leader Hiroaki Ishiura in Japan's Super Formula ahead of the title decider at Suzuka in just over two weeks. While he will race for Toro Rosso this weekend at the same venue, there are doubts over whether Gasly will remain in the car beyond this weekend's Japanese Grand Prix as the following race in Austin clashes with the Super Formula conclusion.

While Gasly admits the decision is not up to him, he says he is looking at the bigger picture of wanting to race in F1.

"In the end it's not going to be my decision to not be in Suzuka [with Super Formula]," Gasly said. "We will see. If I can have the title, then with Formula Renault two liters, GP2 and Super Formula on the CV it looks nice, but then my goal in my life is to be in F1 so we will see.

"If I can finish the year in F1, then I will finish the year in F1. It's my final target, it's exactly where I want to be, in Formula 1. I think it could be a really useful experience. I keep learning in the car and feeling more confident, so all the laps I can get with the team will be useful for the future."

And after finishing his first-ever grand prix in 14th place at Sepang on Sunday, Gasly believes there is a lot more to come from him as he gains experience in an F1 car.

"It's difficult to say but I think I will keep improving for many races," he said. "When you look at the guys in the paddock, most of them have been here for quite a while, so they know how things work, they're coming to the track knowing exactly how things happened here before so for me, for the next races I do – I don't know which ones exactly – but at the moment I just have to take each station at a time.

"I feel better and better, I have better feedback from the car, better feeling so I feel that I can do better and I know station after station I will improve. I think the pace overall was pretty good, compared to Carlos [Sainz] this weekend so I feel happy that I can extract even more from the car.

"I will keep working from my side and hopefully the car can be a bit more competitive in Suzuka and we can fight for better positions."