The Enstone-based team enjoyed a breakthrough 2021 Formula 1 season, with Esteban Ocon winning his first Grand Prix in Hungary.
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According to CEO Laurent Rossi, the Alpine Formula One team believes they will be able to “gain a lot of ground” in 2022. The Enstone-based team enjoyed a breakthrough 2021 Formula 1 season, with Esteban Ocon winning his first Grand Prix in Hungary, and Rossi feels that the sacrifices the team made in 2021 will ultimately reward them in the 2022 season.
“We haven’t improved the car that much,” Rossi said in an interview to Motorsport.com. “The car is what it is. And this single-seater has suffered more and more over the years, because the slightest change in the regulations turned out to be quite harmful given the philosophy of the car. For [2021] we knew it was going to be tough in Bahrain, we knew it was going to be a slow car, even though it’s relative. And we knew we were going to stop development after Baku,” he added.
Following the resignation of Marcin Budkowski, the Alpine F1 team has restructured its workforce, and the team also disclosed this week that four-time Formula One World Champion and Alpine advisor Alain Prost, who had been with the team since 2017, has departed his role. The team’s management structure isn’t the only thing that has changed coming into the 2022 season; the squad will also be using a completely new Renault engine specification.
Read More – Alain Prost slams Alpine CEO after acrimonious departure from team
“There’s not a lot of nervousness, because we’re in a position to gain a lot of ground. There’s a lot of positives for us. Of course we can do worse than this year, but I doubt it. I think we have good development on the engine side – different [development], which was necessary – good development on the power side. car. We are sticking to the program we have set ourselves for the start of the year,” Rossi said.
According to Rossi, the new Renault standard engine will put Alpine closer to the other teams in terms of car performance.
“And that brings us closer, maybe not to the level of the top teams, but we don’t know. Because we assume that if we gain so many aero points, kilowatts and electrical energy deployment, we will reduce the gap between the best and us, assuming that the best will continue to improve,” the Alpine CEO explained.
