Is Oscar Piastri right to want to leave Alpine ?

Facts : It's the summer soap opera Formula 1. In response to the surprise departure of Fernando Alonso in Aston Martin, Alpine decided to promote his reserve driver Oscar piastri to the rank of holder alongsideEsteban Ocon for 2023. Except that the young Australian took everyone by surprise by affirming that he would not drive for the French team next year. So, is Oscar Piastri right to want to leave Alpine ?

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Yes, by Valentin Glo

The young Australian was programmed to burst the screen, but not in this way. Champion in Formula Renault (2019) Formula 3 (2020) then Formula 2 (2021) consecutively, Oscar Piastri is expected as the future star of Formula 1, a discipline which also likes to show it during its television broadcasts or on its social networks whenever the opportunity arises. His short promotion at Alpine in 2023 was also with joy by many fans of the discipline, eager to see him at work in the premier category of motorsport.

Except that the Melbourne native is now at the center of attention for his about-face. Just an hour after the French team's announcement, Piastri brushed it aside with a devastating tweet, refusing a promotion that every young driver dreams of. You have to be cheeky to dismiss a top 5 team in the world championship like this. Or very sure of his fact. Managed by his compatriot Mark Webber, experienced in the jungle that is Formula 1, Piastri had had enough of being patient. Alpine has certainly decided to promote him for 2023, but it is an open secret to know that this was not the original plan of the team at the A arrow.

This initially counted on Fernando Alonso for an additional year on the grid before sending him to play elsewhere on the side of the 24 Hours of Le Mans with an LMDh just waiting for him. The double Spanish champion did not hear it that way and decided to give up. Aware that he would probably not have his chance for 2023, Piastri, a young talent with a meteoric trajectory, logically decided to go and see if the grass was greener elsewhere, probably in a team that rivals Alpine in the ranking. Who could blame him? The French team surely feels wronged in this matter, but in such a competitive environment, the driver could not take the risk of remaining in the closet for one more season, or put away in a back-of-the-pack team like Williams where he would have been champing at the bit.

PIASTRI Oscar (aus), Reserve Driver of Alpine F1 Team, portrait during the Formula 1 Pirelli Grand Premio de Espana 2022, 6th round of the 2022 FIA Formula One World Championship, on the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, from May 20 to 22, 2022 in Montmelo, Spain – Photo Xavi Bonilla / DPPI

No, by Medhi Casaurang-Vergez

What fly could have bitten Oscar Piastri? The Australian hopeful has ample talent to succeed in Formula 1, as we have clearly seen with his meteoric rise through the promotion formulas (titles in F. Renault Eurocup, F3 and F2) between 2019 and 2021. But the young A man from the Antipodes, however, does not yet have a keen sense of loyalty. On a moral level, Oscar Piastri let go of the hand that had been giving him food for three years. Despite the pandemic, and the climate of uncertainty that reigned in 2020, Renault (then Alpine) has always kept his word in the development program that the academy had to offer to the Melbourne native. However, we must not be naive, in motorsport as in business, the moral sense does not always prevail, especially at a young age where personal ambition is as great as Everest.

So let's approach the question from another angle. On a sporting level, the idea of ​​leaving Alpine to wear the colors of one of the three leading teams (Red Bull, Ferrari, Mercedes) could have agreed. The Blues are not the benchmark of the field and Oscar Piastri dreams more of a title, and not of finishing in fifth place in a race which would be worth an exploit. But there is no solid evidence to prove that McLaren would be better able to offer this life to the Australian. The two teams are neck and neck in the championship (99 points for Alpine, 95 for McLaren) at the time of the summer break. If we widen the spectrum, it is even the French team which is progressing faster than McLaren in recent years. In 2021, McLaren finished at the foot of the podium with a margin of 120 points over Alpine. Since 2019, the Woking team has always been ahead of the French brand, called Renault at the time. The advantage has disappeared this season.

McLaren also remains a Mercedes customer team. We may hear Zak Brown's thirst for glory, but his company buys engines from a rival entity, which would certainly not agree to be outflanked in the long term. McLaren is a partner from whom we can accept a few strokes of brilliance, here and there, but not to get involved in the fight for the title. Wheras'Alpine built everything in-house, chassis and engine! This mastery of its components from A to Z allows it to not depend on any opposing team and therefore to give itself the means to achieve its ambitions. Ambitions that were similar to those of Piastri.

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