Scarred for Life Alpine Takes a Bold Step to “Eliminate the Loopholes” After Oscar Piastri Saga

An eventful Formula 1 season is always an exciting prospect for the fans and sometimes for the drivers and the teams as well. However, there are teams who come out scarred from such a season. This was the case with Alpine in the 2022 season. The team not only lost their current driver but also lost their back driver to a rival team. What hurt Alpine more is that they were caught in a loophole that made them lose their backup driver and future star, Oscar Piastri. However, the team has now vowed to never repeat that mistake and “eliminate the loopholes.”

We all know Fernando Alonso moved to Aston Martin, making an Alpine scamper to announce Oscar Piastri. However, Piastri’s public and quite humiliating McLaren accouchement left the entire Alpine management red-faced. To add insult to injury, Alpine even lost the appeal they made to the Contract Recognition Board.

This extremely unfavorable turn of events has made the French team and their boss, Otmar Szafnauer careful about the future. Speaking to the press as quoted by Total-Motorsport, he said, “Species that cooperate survive. Species that are selfish become extinct. In the future, we will treasure these lessons and make sure that we eliminate the loopholes that allowed Oscar to get out of the contract we thought we had with him.”

Read More: After the Infamous Oscar Piastri Snub, Alpine Strikes Back at the McLaren Driver With Stunning Pierre Gasly Confession

Moreover, this is not what Alpine had in mind, heading into the 2023 season at all. In fact, the French team had planned Piastri’s promotion and Alonso’s retention with the team well in advance.

Alpine boss reveals how they planned to promote Oscar Piastri into a racing seat while holding onto Fernando Alonso

Szafnauer was absolutely livid with this entire saga. His statement tells us as much. The reason behind his anger could be the careful planning and long-drawn planning that all went to waste because of the contract loophole.

The French team had planned to move Piastri to a racing seat in 2024 after a loan spell in 2023. Moreover, Alpine planned to move Alonso to its sports cars program for 2024. However, neither plan materialized and Alpine was left frustrated.

Learning from their mistakes, the boss said, “What happened in the summer was not what we had planned in December 2021. We can say that we should have done things differently so that the plan to promote Oscar would actually have been realised.”

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A lot to talk about for the entire F1 community and a lot to learn for Alpine. Can we call it a win-win scenario?