“Not at All”: Alain Prost Rebuffs Any Role of Fernando Alonso in His Alpine F1 Exit

Former F1 driver Alain Prost has left his advisor role at the Alpine F1 team. In the latest development, Prost parted ways with the French team citing personal reasons. The former world champion took up a non-executive director role with Renault in 2019. But his exit from the team is not the most decorated one and there has been a lot of fuss about it; some even suspect the involvement of Fernando Alonso in management calls.

Prost took to social media to clarify the chain of events that led to it. The Frenchman accused the Groupe Renault team of showing a lack of respect to him. The news broke out on Monday citing management calls over the non-renewal of his contract. However, that is not the case as per Prost and he is disappointed with the manner in which this scenario is being played out.

In his latest Instagram post, the 66-year-old gave an insight into the scenes behind the walls. “I am very disappointed how this news has been announced today! It was agreed that we would announce together with @alpinef1team ! No respect sorry! I have refused the offer made to me in abudhabi for the 2022 season because of a personal relationship and I was right! To the enstone and Viry team, I will miss you,” penned Alain Prost in the caption. 

But the speculations over the potential reason for his exit are making rounds on social media. A user asked Prost if Fernando Alonso is the reason behind structural changes in the team. Prost denied the claim straightaway.

Prost denies Fernando Alonso to be the reason for his exit

At the end of the 2020 F1 season, Alpine, the erstwhile Renault team, went through a major restructuring phase under the ambitious Renaulution strategic plan. There were some bold calls being made in the managerial department then as well. After a year of this ambitious plan, Alpine recorded major growth in sales across countries.

Now, after another bold move of discontinuing Prost from his role, there have been speculations if former world champion Fernando Alonso is calling the shots inside the team. An Instagram user (username- 6russes) commented on Alain Prost’s latest post saying, “Is it Alonso that begins to destroy everything?” (translated via google translation)

Prost was quick to respond in disagreement. He replied to the comment saying, “not at all he is top and very correct” (translated via google translation). Prost has been a huge admirer of Alonso over the Spaniard’s illustrious career. He famously regarded him as the best driver on the 2021 grid, ahead of Lewis Hamilton, Max Verstappen, and Sebastian Vettel.

Now, after the acrimonious exit of Prost, there are chances that Otmar Szafnauer will join the team soon. We’ll see how that plays out for the team as they prepare to field the cars next month for the winter testing ahead of the inaugural Bahrain GP weekend in March.

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