Word of Caution Sent Over Oscar Piastri As Alpine Honcho Wrapped Up the Australian Driver’s Soap Opera: “If I Were the CEO Of..”

Formula 1 has rarely seen a controversy where two teams fought for a single driver. In order to acquire the service of the prodigy, two teams even went for a legal battle. Such was the hype of Oscar Piastri as McLaren and Alpine tussled for the Australian. In the end, McLaren won the battle and replaced Daniel Ricciardo with Piastri to set him alongside Lando Norris. As the world moves on from the Piastri transfer saga, Netflix’s latest season brought it back all over again with the Alpine team principal dropping a bombshell. Episode six of the docu-series has Otmar Szafnauer take a dig at McLaren driver Oscar Piastri and its CEO Zak Brown.

Szafnauer shared with Netflix that he would’ve taken Gasly instead of fighting for Piastri if he was the CEO. The Romanian-American boss told to Netflix, “I’m just happy that we have two top drivers.” Szafnauer went on, “Knowing what I know now, and looking back at everything that’s happened if I were the CEO of McLaren, I’d have taken Pierre Gasly.”

When asked if Alpine was going to file a lawsuit against Piastri, Szafnauer said he was happy with having Gasly instead and there was no need for that. He said, “For me with Oscar not coming to our team and appointing Pierre Gasly, that could work out even better. There’s no need for a lawsuit.”

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After the hard tussle, Oscar Piastri finally joined McLaren after the Contract Recognition Board gave his ties with McLaren a green signal. Piastri was cleared to race for the British giants in the 2023 and 2024 F1 seasons.

Otmar Szafnauer backs his Pierre Gasly choice

As Alpine lost the legal battle to secure Oscar Piastri’s services, they were elated to get Pierre Gasly instead. A driver with huge potential and ample racecraft is no less when replacing the outgoing two-time F1 world champion Fernando Alonso was in question.

Szafnauer, who was relatively happy to have the Frenchman’s service, said, “We’ll be putting somebody in with experience. Somebody that’s won a race, knows how to win races, and has more than a 100 races under his belt. We’ll be taking Pierre Gasly.”

Gasly, who joined Alpine from AlphaTauri, after getting rid of Red Bull shackles, shared on the move, “Emotionally, it’s something very unique. Racing for a French team, being French, and just be able to start this new adventure and this new chapter for my career.”

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Statistically, Gasly has 108 race entries to his name where he won a race and picked the three podiums. The Frenchman raced with the teams like Toro Rosso [now AlphaTauri], and Red Bull, came back to AlphaTauri again, and finally, he’ll start for Alpine this season. All in all, it has been a win-win situation for Alpine and Otmar Szafnauer.