Alpine don’t need Alonso to improve

Fernando Alonso will be leaving Alpine at the end of the 2022 season, and his current teammate Esteban Ocon believes the Spaniard will not be a big miss for the French team.

Ocon believes Alpine do not need Fernando Alonso to help the team improve, as the Frenchman outlines his team’s plans for 2023. It was confirmed in August that Alonso would be departing Alpine to join Formula 1 rivals Aston Martin.

Losing the sport’s most experienced driver and a two-time world champion will no doubt leave a hole in the French team’s setup, but Alonso’s teammate Ocon is more than confident his team can continue to push on next campaign without the Spaniard. Speaking to Marca ahead of last week’s Japanese Grand Prix, the French driver said: “I am really convinced that we can keep moving forward, as we are doing right now with Fernando in the team.

“Fernando is going to another team and we have to accept it – that’s how it is. But we know that we can achieve the goal that we have set for ourselves. I’m going to miss Fernando personally when he’s gone, but it will still be fun to keep racing against him.”

It was an impressive week for Alpine in Japan, with both drivers scoring thanks for a fourth place finish for Ocon and Alonso crossing the line in seventh. Throughout the wet and windy race, Ocon enjoyed a battle with seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton, in which he came out on top of.

Discussing the battle, he told Formula1.com : “It’s very good that we’ve scored that many points. It was looking like we had nothing in the beginning, you know – there was no racing, the weather was really bad. Eventually, [the rainfall] reduced.

“I was still not confident that we would be able to go (racing again), but the track did clear quite quickly and it was good to finally get going. From there on, the fighting with Lewis, I enjoyed it a lot – it was a lot of fun.

“It was a bit of a karting battle, trying different lines; not one corner (was) I not watching my mirrors! It was definitely good fun (and) I’m very happy with the outcome.” -DailyMirror.