Laurent Rossi is angry: Alpine must react quickly
When the CEO of a brand comes to berate his racing team, the situation is grave. Alpine completely misses the mark at the start of the season and Laurent Rossi is livid.
Laurent Rossi, the CEO of Alpine, witnessed, almost powerless, a rather unpleasant start of the season for the French team. Times are not necessarily better in Endurance, with an out-of-pace LMP2.
In four Grand Prix, Alpine has only accumulated eight points, which are equally shared by Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon. But the two Frenchmen had more to prove, especially in Australia where they crashed into the wall. The A523 can work well. However, everything needs to be perfectly executed.
This is indeed the reproach of Laurent Rossi to his team. « The assessment of this start of the season is disappointing. Bad even. We have a handicap in both performance and execution quality and it shows. Our ranking is unworthy of the resources invested (in the project). We are far from the final goal of the season. We are talking about half a billion euros invested each year. »
Weakly asserted and unshakeable ambitions at Alpine
The Alpine team had a good 2022 season, finishing in 4th place among the constructors. But Fernando Alonso’s departure, combined with his current success at Aston Martin, raises an important question: the Spanish driver has found, within the British team, ambitions that are strongly believed in, which justify significant resources.
On the French side, the hype surrounding the French duo Ocon-Gasly was enough to make one’s mouth water. But Laurent Rossi sees that the will and the hunger to win seem to be lacking in his troops.
The mentality is not at all up to what this team has achieved in the past, especially in terms of victories and titles. The first Grand Prix was marked by a lot of amateurism, which resulted in a mediocre outcome. And the race in Baku strongly reminded us of the one in Bahrain. Making mistakes is part of the learning process, but making the same mistakes over and over again is not acceptable.
The Blues will certainly have a chance to redeem themselves this Sunday for the Miami Grand Prix: Pierre Gasly has shown a very good pace and will start 5th, Esteban Ocon 8th.
