EXCLUSIVE: ‘There will be consequences’ – Furious Rossi demands Alpine improve fast after stuttering start to 2023.
For Rossi, their struggles are not down to a lack of resources. Yes, they do not have the kind of facilities, hardware and software to rival Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari – but Alpine have invested heavily in all of those areas in recent years and are continuing to do so.
08 May 2023
Lawrence Barretto
F1 Correspondent & Presenter
Formula One - Official Site

It is clear the Frenchman is irritated by the situation. Having come in and restructured the team, and playing a very hands-on role for more than a year, Rossi recruited Otmar Szafnauer from Aston Martin as Team Principal and stepped back to do his day job of running Alpine Cars, of which F1 is one strand and features only two of his 18 direct reports.

It was now up to Szafnauer – with his wealth of experience that includes 13 years at Force India/Racing Point/Aston Martin – to utilise his extensive F1 experience and continue Alpine’s upward trajectory. So, does that mean Szafnauer is responsible for Alpine’s poor start to 2023?

‘There will be consequences’;

https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/a...2a4u2T2yl.html


Alpine CEO makes Szafnauer demand and threatens changes
17:49 Mon, 08 May 2023.
By Josh Suttill and Scott Mitchell-Malm
The Race

Alpine CEO Laurent Rossi says “he won’t wait until the end of the year” to make changes if Alpine’s Formula 1 team keeps underdelivering in 2023. Rossi launched into a scathing criticism of Renault’s works team ahead of the Miami Grand Prix, telling French broadcaster Canal+ that Alpine’s season had been “disappointing” and it was in a position “that is not at all worthy of the resources invested”.

More criticism from Rossi during the Miami GP weekend has emerged in an interview on Formula 1’s website, with Rossi saying the team is “making too many mistakes” this season. Rossi called for a mindset change within the team that “starts with owning up to your mistakes, to not repeat the mistakes and to learn from your mistakes”.

He said there’s been “a lot of excuses” for the “poor performance and a lack of operational excellence” this year. “I need to tackle this, I need the right people to tackle this,” Rossi added. “I need the team to be aware they need to do that as it’s not up to me – it’s up to them, they have to do it. It’s their responsibility. I hope they make the same diagnosis. I will make it clear to them that this is the diagnosis and they need to fix that.”

“Won’t wait until the end of the year”;

https://the-race.com/formula-1/alpin...atens-changes/


Gasly lost two places in last five laps as ‘I had to save a lot of fuel’
2023 Miami Grand Prix
Posted on 8th May 2023, 16:558th May 2023, 16:29
Written by Ida Wood and RJ O'Connell
RaceFans

Pierre Gasly scored his best finish of the season so far last weekend but was disappointed with the result as he fought further up the order during the race. “I had a great start, managed to pass for P4, and tried to keep up the pace with Sainz and Alonso in front of me,” said Gasly. “But unfortunately they were just faster than us today.”

“So I tried to do the best we could. In the second stint I was running in P6 then with 15 laps to go, I needed to do a lot of fuel-saving, which was a little annoying when you know that you have a Ferrari and Mercedes behind catching and closing on you. I wanted to give everything we could, but at the same time we needed to save the fuel, and we saw Charles just catching us slowly lap by lap. And unfortunately with four laps to go he managed to pass.”

The circumstances of the race made it more difficult than usual for teams to accurately judge how much fuel they needed. Miami’s new track surface gave varying levels of grip during the race weekend and the grand prix ran without a Safety Car or Virtual Safety Car appearance.

‘Needed to do a lot of fuel-saving’;

https://www.racefans.net/2023/05/08/...a-lot-of-fuel/


Alpine CEO slates team’s ‘unacceptable’ and ‘amateurish’ early season performances
08 May 2023 10:00 AM
Michelle Foster
PlanetF1.com

Alpine CEO Laurent Rossi was not holding back in his criticism of the team’s early season form, saying they were showing “amateurishness” in Bahrain and it wasn’t any better in Baku.

“It’s disappointing, it’s actually bad,” he said. “This year ended up starting with a flawed performance and flawed delivery. It’s obvious our position in the standings is not worthy of the resources we spend, and we are quite far – in fact very far – from this year’s end goal.”

“I’m noting not only an obvious lack of performance and rigour in the delivery, but also potentially a state of mind that is not up to this team’s past standards.” He added: “I did not like the first grand prix, because there was a lot of – I’m sorry for saying this – amateurishness, which led to a result that wasn’t right. It was mediocre, bad. And the last race in Baku was tremendously similar to the one in Bahrain. That is not acceptable.”

‘Unacceptable’ and ‘Amateurish’

https://www.planetf1.com/news/alpine...-performances/


Alpine CEO slams own team in epic spray as midfield bolter exposes brutal truth
May 9th, 2023 5:04 pm
Michael Lamonato from Fox Sports
FoxSports(Australia).

There’s a special place for the spray among the armoury of motivational tools. Carefully calibrated it can energise the troops to lift to another level at a critical juncture. Misdirected and it will be little more effective than a kick to the guts at a low moment.

Whether Alpine CEO Laurent Rossi’s evisceration of his own team at the weekend’s Miami Grand Prix falls into the former or latter category is up for debate. Five rounds into the season and Rossi is clearly fed up. If drivers aren’t fumbling qualifying performances, they’re crashing into the walls or they’re wiping each other out of races.

If the team isn’t making mistakes serving penalties, its cars are spontaneously combusting. All Alpine has to show for five rounds of racing is a paltry 14 points and sixth in the constructors championship behind McLaren — and McLaren has been the outright slowest car at two races so far this year.

‘Epic spray’;

https://www.foxsports.com.au/motorsp...57b681f681e9de


Angry Alpine CEO warns ‘the buck stops with Otmar Szafnauer’ for team failure
09 May 2023 7:30 AM
Henry Valantine
PlanetF1.com

After slamming the team for “amateurish” performances at the start of the year, Alpine CEO Laurent Rossi has warned that team principal Otmar Szafnauer is ultimately responsible for the team’s success or failure.

Szafnauer moved across to Alpine at the beginning of last season after leaving the same role at Aston Martin, the team which he had represented in its various guises for over a decade, with Alpine jumping up to fourth place in the Constructors’ Championship at the end of 2022.

But the beginning of this season has been much tougher from their perspective overall, with a series of reliability issues and a collision between their drivers, Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon, ending both of their races in Australia in April.

‘Buck stops with Otmar Szafnauer’;

https://www.planetf1.com/news/alpine...mar-szafnauer/


Szafnauer to speak with CEO Rossi over Alpine 'amateur' blast
08 May 4:00PM
Author Jake Nichol
Co-author Aaron Deckers
RacingNews365

Alpine CEO Laurent Rossi had branded the team's start to 2023 as "amateurish" following various mishaps. Alpine Team Principal Otmar Szafnauer says he will be seeking discussions with CEO Laurent Rossi after he branded the team's start to the 2023 Formula 1 season as "amateurish."

The Enstone squad have had a slow start to the campaign, featuring a horror weekend in Baku where they suffered a fire, a crash and were forced to start Esteban Ocon from the pit-lane, while he and Pierre Gasly collided in the Australian GP restart chaos. "Reading something like that in the paper puts no more pressure on, everyone wants to do well here," Szafnauer told media, including RacingNews365.com, of Rossi's comments made to French TV over the Miami weekend.

"They're well experienced technicians and engineers at the highest level, and we put pressure on ourselves so we just have to fix it. I have no idea [why the comments were made], you'll have to ask him, but I'll be asking him. This weekend was busy that I haven't had a chance yet.”

‘Seeking discussions’;

https://racingnews365.com/szafnauer-...-amateur-blast