Otmar Szafnauer has revealed that he knew his time with Alpine’s Formula 1 team would be “problematic” when he was given less control than he had been promised.
Szafnauer was appointed as Alpine’s Team Principal in 2022 and his debut campaign at the helm was promising as it came fourth in the Constructors’ Championship.
However, the Enstone-based squad was unable to sustain that momentum in the second term under F1’s current rules as it slipped behind Aston Martin and McLaren.
Despite Esteban Ocon collecting an impressive podium in Monaco, Alpine elected to make another change to the management as Szafnauer was ousted in July 2023.
Szafnauer has since criticised Alpine on several occasions, claiming that the Renault board lacked the essential “understanding” needed to be successful in the sport.
However, the ex-Aston Martin boss has now conceded that he was aware that he was up against it when he discovered that things did not operate how he envisioned.
“There’s a few things that went wrong at Alpine, one of which was I didn’t have control over the entire team,” Szafnauer told the High Performance podcast.
“So for example, and I knew straight away: [human resources] didn’t report to me, reported up through France;
The finance office didn’t report to me, reported up through France.
“The communications department didn’t report to me and the marketing group, commercial, didn’t report to me. And that in itself I knew was going to be problematic.
“Before I took the job, it was ‘everyone’s reporting to me’. I get there and that’s not the case.
“And I knew at the beginning – I thought I could manage it, but I knew it’s just problematic.”
Szafnauer defends Alpine tenure
Alpine has since undergone more turmoil since Szafnauer’s departure as his replacement, Bruno Famin, has now stepped back to allow Oliver Oakes to take the reins.
The Anglo-French marque has regressed to ninth place this season with 12 points in 18 rounds, while it has pulled the plug on Renault’s engine production from 2025.
Szafnauer believes Alpine’s sharp decline in the period since he managed the side proves that he wasn’t the reason that it was struggling to make progress back then.
“I don’t know where they are today – ninth or something in the championship – today it’s a disaster,” he added.
“Back then, yeah, it’s a half-step back, but sometimes you take a half-step back to take two steps forward.”
READ MORE: Esteban Ocon highlights contributing factor behind Alpine’s F1 failures
