2022 Alpine F1 Team

[Karim.E]

UNSUBSTANTIAED murmurs from around the team suggest this was a Rossi hatchet job. What reason? No idea. But word is that Rossi is in over his head at this role and a major liability. Will eventually get found out. Could be just from people sympathetic to Budkowski.

Hiring Otmar wouldn't be a outrageous move.

Disclaimer: this could very well prove to be complete hearsay but since the rumor about Budkowski and Otmar(probably) was proven to be true, I thought this tidbit was also worth throwing out. It may but something to watch out for as a possible reason if Alpine doesn't progress.

Nothing to do with Otmar in particular. This is from piecing together some rumblings from someone possibly from Piastri's camp (but definitely plugged in with junior series) about how Rossi impulsively gave Ocon that contract extension and in general lacks accountability. Then there was similar stuff about Budkowski being unceremoniously let go which also gets credence from the picture.

Definitely could be coming from massively biased sources (hopefully), but something to keep an eye on and revisit if things dont go well.

Well Laurent Rossi is basically dissablemling everything Abiteboul has done.

Luca De Meo decided he was not happy with what he was seeming from Cyril's skill.

Given this interview from Laurent Rossi back in november it was a pretty clear foregone conclusion that he was going to fire Budkowski like he did fire Remi Taffin.

https://www.autohebdo.fr/actualites/f1/ ... -team.html

Saying that the team is not up to stick in order to fight in the front for 2022 like Rossi said is a pretty damning statement for Budkowski and Abiteboul.

Laurent Rossi also heavily criticised the decision to delay the introduction of the new engine concept from 2021 to 2022.

Regarding Ocon's contract extension, i'm pretty sure that De Meo's gave the thumb up as pretty much sealed the deal himself for Alonso comeback.

[Neno]

Let's make clear facts.
Firing Machin as head of aero and hiring De Beer was upgrade for Renault/Alpine.
Firing Nick Chester and hiring Pat Fry was upgrade for Renault/Alpine.
Firing Cyril with intention of replacing and improving a team was good decision. Let's be real, results under his management were overall disaster for manufacturer standards, regardless what you think of budget he was given. Only reason some of you like him is because of fake Netflix drama F1 show. If Otmar comes to Alpine and brings Green along it's overall upgrade for Alpine. Regardless of failure with Brivio or Budkowski during span of one year. Or even with Budkowski leaving for whoever. Even him was hired to improve once staff talent on a team.

Yes it's messy how some things were done, but overall each time when Alpine made decision to fire and hire. They actually upgraded and improved a team. Having stability is great when you are top team. Because you wanna continue be stable at top. To get to a top you need to mix and shuffle on positions you think you can get better. Alpine tried with internal improvement, they tried hire outside F1 but now opportunity arise to get good principal. And you dont pass that for some fake stability.

[Mansell89]

Concerning to see Alpine, who had seemingly spent so long on setting up for the new regs, losing all of the people involved in putting it in place.

Sounds like the PU may have reliability concerns too reading between the lines of recent interviews- kept being a reference to “making sure it’s reliable” but that the performance should be a step forward.

Hopefully Pat Fry can do an awesome job for them and steer them to a great car regardless of the leadership change.

[diffuser]

Concerning to see Alpine, who had seemingly spent so long on setting up for the new regs, losing all of the people involved in putting it in place.

Sounds like the PU may have reliability concerns too reading between the lines of recent interviews- kept being a reference to “making sure it’s reliable” but that the performance should be a step forward.

Hopefully Pat Fry can do an awesome job for them and steer them to a great car regardless of the leadership change.

They haven't lost anyone I thought was worth keeping. Rossi didn't understand why they didn't introduce the new PU last year and the wind tunnel issue at the end of 2020 fell square on Budkowski's shoulders.

I'd be disappointed if they don't have reliability issues. They need to push the envelope, cause after this, they're only allowed reliability upgrades.

[diffuser]

Budkowski on gardening leave.

https://www.planetf1.com/news/marcin- ... g-leave/

[wogx]

[AtlasZX]

maybe they need to compare the new P.U. with the old one on the same car... still, I'm a bit concerned that if true, it means they are far behind in their schedule.

[olahOPO23]

I have a feeling they may have found something, that they don’t want the other teams see and copy for the first race.. or ask FIA to ban immediately

[Jolle]

So, the man in charge get fired and then a report that the new car won't show up at the first test.

[AeroDynamic]

That’s not good. It does prove they are behind their target dates. No team throws away testing time on a new car. Alonso would be very, very displeased.

Renault / Alpine continue to be a mess that is sorting itself out. But you never know, Brawn was in a mess but came out the force to be reckoned with in 09.

[wogx]

Take it with a grain of salt. I've posted it because it's a rumour about Alpine, and we're in the middle of winter. It's not an official source, yesterday they twitted that:



There is also a news from another source:

Alpine can "gain a lot of ground" in 2022

By: Benjamin Vinel

Jan 16, 2022 at 12:25 PM

The Alpine team is optimistic about its position in the 2022 hierarchy.

Alpine can "gain a lot of ground" in 2022Could we see Alpine move to the front this year, or at least get closer? At least that's the hope of Laurent Rossi, the brand's CEO. In 2021, despite its victory at the Hungarian Grand Prix, the French team could only manage to stay fifth in the world rankings. This is the same result as in the previous two seasons, moreover by scoring only seven points per race against ten and a half in 2020. However, it was clearly expected.

"We didn't improve the car that much," Laurent Rossi points out, while the chassis were frozen in 2021. "The car is what it is. And this single-seater has suffered more and more over the years, because the slightest change in regulations has proved rather harmful given the philosophy of the car. For [2021], we knew it was going to be difficult in Bahrain, we knew it was going to be a slow car, although that's relative. And we knew we were going to stop development after Baku.

"The 2022 technical regulations, however, are expected to shake up the hierarchy and represent an opportunity to gain ground for an Alpine team that has been working on it for some time now, not only in terms of aero but also the Renault engine, which has not changed much in its 2021 specification compared to the previous year. It will be different this season.

When asked if he is nervous about this turning point, Rossi said, "There is not much nervousness, because we are in a position to gain a lot of ground. There are a lot of positives for us. Of course we can do worse than this year, but I doubt it. I think we have a good development on the engine side - [a different] development, which was needed - a good development on the car side. We're keeping the schedule we set for ourselves for the beginning of the year."

"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 electric power deployment, we will close the gap between the top teams and us, assuming that the top teams will continue to progress."

Interview by Jonathan Noble

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator

https://fr.motorsport.com/f1/news/alpin ... 2/7189799/

[Blackout]

That’s not good. It does prove they are behind their target dates. No team throws away testing time on a new car. Alonso would be very, very displeased.

Renault / Alpine continue to be a mess that is sorting itself out. But you never know, Brawn was in a mess but came out the force to be reckoned with in 09.

Do you really believe they'll show up in the first test with an RS.18 powered by the new PU?

Dont believe that Alpine update twitter guy, a big amount of infos got lost in translation with him and he very often get things mixed up. So take his infos with a big pinch of salt.

I think he's just repeating that silly F1 cliché: "we wont see the real car before melbourne/sakhir/the last testing day"

[AeroDynamic]

That’s not good. It does prove they are behind their target dates. No team throws away testing time on a new car. Alonso would be very, very displeased.

Renault / Alpine continue to be a mess that is sorting itself out. But you never know, Brawn was in a mess but came out the force to be reckoned with in 09.

Do you really believe they'll show up in the first test with an RS.18 powered by the new PU?

Dont believe that Alpine update twitter guy, a big amount of infos got lost in translation with him and he very often get things mixed up. So take his infos with a big pinch of salt.

I think he's just repeating that silly F1 cliché: "we wont see the real car before melbourne/sakhir/the last testing day"

Haha no, I misunderstood the conversation as meaning they were missing the first test.

[PowerandtheGlory]

Surely you couldnt turn up to the test with a mule car- because in aero terms it would be completely against the new rules? Yes you could put the new engine, and the bigger wheels on a ‘21 car… but your aero data is going to he well off the new regs?
If renault- sorry Alpine… want to a shakedown the engine and/or livery then surely a filming day? That gives them mileage to test the engine..
But why bother bringing a non ground effect mule car to a test weekend- when the other cars might be ground effect?
You might end up P18 & P19… or high up the order…. and look ridiculous… and have no data

[Neno]

Surely you couldnt turn up to the test with a mule car- because in aero terms it would be completely against the new rules? Yes you could put the new engine, and the bigger wheels on a ‘21 car… but your aero data is going to he well off the new regs?
If renault- sorry Alpine… want to a shakedown the engine and/or livery then surely a filming day? That gives them mileage to test the engine..
But why bother bringing a non ground effect mule car to a test weekend- when the other cars might be ground effect?
You might end up P18 & P19… or high up the order…. and look ridiculous… and have no data

I dont think test requires you to drive exact car specification of rules. I mean we had teams driving old chassis and drive with illegal parts on cars before. But reason teams not doing that much is usually limited testing time. Alpine can build some kind of mule car with ground effect and drive it around track to put milage on engine if that's only thing they wanna do.

But is it worth it? If they found something late in car development it make sense not to bring car on test. Because car is not ready. And maybe needs to be redesigned. And I dont buy stories about Alpine not being ready for 2022. They were first and moreso team which planned and prepared multiple years in advance for 2022. They were first team along Ferrari which passed crash test for new cars more than year ago. It's not like they dont have money, staff or resources.