Why F1 team's desperate move can't stop lonely slide into abyss

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Why F1 team's DESPERATE move can't stop lonely slide into abyss

What may have seemed like a smart move could indicate some serious desperation

Daniel Austin

Tuesday 25 June 2024 16:57

Having spent the 2024 season so far trundling around at the back of the field, Alpine equalled their best result of the year at last weekend’s Spanish Grand Prix, as both Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon finished in the points for the second time in succession.

Their double ninth-and-tenth place finishes in Canada and Spain mean the French squad has now surpassed both Williams and Haas to rise to seventh in the standings, and their performance around the Circuit de Catalunya-Barcelona was genuinely impressive, with both cars deservedly reaching the final round of qualifying on Saturday before consolidating their outing with consistent race pace on Sunday.

Though the bar may have been low beforehand, that is a significant improvement for a team which has dropped further and further towards the back since the start of F1’s new era of regulations in 2022.

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But far more significant for Alpine’s future than the three points they earned in Spain was the news that Flavio Briatore is making a formal return to the team as an executive advisor.

His remit will see him "focus on top level areas of the team” including “scouting top talents and providing insights on the driver market, challenging the existing project by assessing the current structure and advising on some strategic matters within the sport", according to Luca de Meo, CEO of Alpine’s parent company Renault.

Hiring the 74-year-old may seem like a no-brainer - after all, he was the man who led the Enstone squad to the world championship title with Michael Schumacher in 1994 and 1995 when it raced under the Benetton brand name, before repeating the feat when it was renamed Renault with Fernando Alonso in 2005 and 2006.

But the Italian, who entered the F1 paddock with Benetton after working as a manager for the fashion company, is one of the most controversial figures in the modern history of Formula 1.

Briatore was team principal of Renault in 2008 when driver Nelson Piquet Jr. was instructed to deliberately crash at the Singapore Grand Prix, helping team-mate Fernando Alonso win the race, and was subsequently banned indefinitely from the sport by the FIA for his involvement. The ban was later overturned by a French court.

He was also convicted of multiple counts of fraud in Italy in the 1980s and was handed a variety of prison sentences by the courts, later living as a fugitive in the Virgin Islands to avoid incarceration.

Alpine team principal Bruno Famin, though, insists that Briatore’s legal issues in F1 and beyond are an irrelevance. "I don’t really mind about the past,” Famin said.

“I am always looking to the future and how we get better. Flavio can help us - he has a very high-level knowledge of F1 [and] he knows a lot of people. He is a 40-year experience guy in F1. He knows how to operate a winning team. He has a good record and a number of world titles. He will bring this fighting spirit to the team."

The move is the latest revamp at Alpine, which has undergone a seemingly never-ending series of technical restructures in recent years as its performances and results have diminished. In the past year alone, the team has changed its chief executive, team principal, sporting director, technical director, head of aerodynamics, operations director and engineering consultant.

Earlier this year, Alpine’s technical leads Matt Harman and Dirk de Beer left the team shortly after the season began and the deficiencies in the car were made clear. In the 2020s the team has had five different team principals, and since finishing fourth in the constructors’ championship in 2016, the team has finished no higher than fifth.

The fact that the team’s trump card is to return to a man who was last successful in F1 two to three decades ago and whose involvement in the ‘crashgate’ scandal rendered him a pariah in the paddock for an extended period, smacks of desperation and cannot alone halt their slide towards the abyss.

Pierre Gasly could depart Alpine before 2025

Alpine is a team in disarray. It has already announced that Ocon will depart at the end of 2024, while Gasly’s contract expires this year too and an extension is far from a foregone conclusion. Meanwhile, Autosport reports that Renault may abandon its F1 engine project from 2026 onwards and turn Alpine into a mere customer team, and performances on-track show little sign of the huge upturn it would take to reach even the upper midfield.

A Renault-owned outfit with the resources, reputation and experience of Alpine should quite simply be operating far higher up the field. The fact they are not is primarily down to the chaotic and incompetent management of the team by owners Renault over so many years.

Briatore may be a big name, but he brings cons as well as pros, and cannot arrest the team’s slide by himself. Renault needs to fundamentally change and improve the way the team is operated for it to be anything other than a backmarker in Formula 1 and a blight on the international marketing strategy of its wider business.

F1 Alpine Pierre Gasly Esteban Ocon Spanish Grand Prix