Interim Alpine F1 boss explains timing of management upheaval

On Friday, Alpine announced they will part ways with team principal Otmar Szafnauer and sporting director Alan Permane following this weekend’s Belgian Grand Prix.

Alpine have also lost chief technical officer Pat Fry, who is joining F1 rivals Williams to head up the British outfit’s technical division. 

Alpine Motorsports vice president Famin has been installed as interim team principal from the Dutch Grand Prix. 

The latest upheaval comes just over a week after former Alpine chief executive officer Laurent Rossi was replaced as CEO.

Speaking in Friday’s FIA press conference in Belgium, Famin admitted Renault’s F1 works team have failed to meet their targets. 

"We have ambition and we've decided to make some changes in order to go faster in reaching the level of performance we are aiming for,” Famin said. 

Famin added that the team, Szafnauer and Permane “were not on the same line, on the timeline to recover the level, or reach the level, of performance we are aiming for.” 

The Frenchman stressed that the decision was “a mutual agreement, first”, but acknowledged the changes ultimately reflect "a decision of the top management”. 

"It's not something that was decided from one day to another,” he continued. “It’s not that I was appointed two weeks ago as vice president of motorsport that I started to work two weeks ago.” 

On Alpine’s succession plan, Famin said: "I have just been appointed two weeks ago as a vice president of motorsport at Alpine, of course we have been discussing that topic with the top management for weeks.

"Now I will really assess with the whole team what is the real situation and what will be the plan. I will take the necessary time to do this assessment and we will decide later on.

"The season so far, the results do not match our expectations, clearly. We were fourth last year. We know that the top three is very strong but we were aiming to keep that fourth place and to maybe fight a little bit more for the third.

"We are not where we wanted, and we will work hard with all the team, with the Enstone guys, with the Viry-Chatillon guys, to extract the best possible performance of our car.”

Famin, who repeatedly referred to the reshuffle as “phase two” of Alpine’s project, expressed confidence that the changes will not derail the team’s 100-race plan to join the front. 

“It’s not going backwards,” he said. “It’s moving forward. Of course its a lot of change but its an opportunity also to have a new foundation or to consolidate the foundation to go faster.”

He added: “We have a clear project, a clear objective. And it's not only the Formula 1 team that has the strategy, it's the full brand, and both are totally linked.

"I'm confident we'll make it work. I don't know what's happened before, as I said we are now launching phase two of the Alpine project, phase one started in '21. 

“We improved a lot of things in Enstone and Viry [Renault's engine base], we are moving the team forward and we will continue to do that.”