F1 News
Can Alpine become a customer team? Wolff and Vasseur share their thoughts
Recently, some rumours suggested that Alpine could become a customer team instead of developing their own engine for 2026, when the new regulations will come into effect. This rumour got further support as Flavio Briatore was brought in as an advisor to the Enstone-based team, and the Italian has experience in making deals happen. Team principal Bruno Famin responded to the matter in Barcelona, while Toto Wolff and Frederic Vasseur also shared their thoughts on the matter.
To begin with, Mercedes CEO and team principal Toto Wolff believes Alpine are still addressing their issues. "I think most of all Bruno [Famin], Flavio [Briatore] and Luca [de Meo] are in the process of assessing what the 2026 package looks like and there's nothing we can say or involve ourselves in that. I've seen the rumours, I've seen the chats that are going on, but at that stage, the Alpine needs to make their decisions and we are on the outside of that."
Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur decided not to share his opinion on the matter, but underlined the difficulty of being a factory team. "You have also to consider that for an engine manufacturer in 2026 it's a huge challenge and for sure we want to have a customer team, we have the deal in place with Haas and to have another one it's also a big challenge," the Frenchman said.
Famin: 'We are making a plan'
Bruno Famin himself remained rather calm. "For the time being when we have something to say we will say but for the time being we are focused on making the plan for gaining performance thanks to our recent support," the Alpine team principal said.
Famin explained the process that is currently ongoing at his team. "On our side, we are focused on redeveloping the performance of the car and improving the team. That's why I'm happy to welcome Flavio on board. This year is not at the level we wanted, we have the support of David Sanchez as the technical director, he's been doing a very good job in Enstone for a few weeks now and we hope to be able to improve our car by the end of the year to work on the 2025 car and of course to look at the 2026 generation car on the engine and we are really focused on that."