Briatore says Alpine’s 2025 sacrifice is paying off

Flavio Briatore says Alpine’s decision to abandon development of its 2025 car is already paying off, with the team outscoring its entire 2025 campaign after just five races of the 2026 Formula 1 season.

Speaking in Monaco, Alpine’s executive advisor said the team “already surpassed its points total from last year” because it chose not to chase a marginal gain in 2025. “If we develop the car still, we are P9 and not P10, there’s no big difference,” Briatore said, explaining that Alpine instead worked “much better in the wind tunnel,” reshaped its engineering group and gained from “the agreement with Mercedes for the power unit.” He also said the switch has allowed Alpine to focus on the chassis and aerodynamics.

The numbers back up the step forward. Pierre Gasly said Alpine has made a “solid start” to the new rules era and sits fifth on 35 points after five races, 13 more than the team managed in the whole of 2025, when it finished last in the standings. Gasly said the difficult 2025 season helped create the current platform, calling it “definitely positive for the start of our campaign this year.”

Briatore argued the improvement is not just about the car concept but about a broader rebuild over the past year and a half. He said Alpine is now “a united, cohesive team” after reconstructing “from the foundations,” with the Mercedes power-unit deal and changes in engineering staffing forming the two main pillars of the reset.

There has also been a lift from the driver line-up, even if Briatore made clear he does not see that as the main issue yet. He said Franco Colapinto has improved since Miami, joking, “We put a new battery!” but adding that the bigger change is that the Argentine has now “settled down.” Briatore contrasted that with last year, when Colapinto was “concentrating on the gossip” rather than only on driving. Gasly, he said, remains a constant reference point. “Pierre is being Pierre,” Briatore said. “The performance of Pierre is always consistent,” and together that has made Alpine “a little bit better, a little bit more competitive.”

Still, Briatore’s main message was that Alpine cannot mistake early progress for arriving where it needs to be. “We are not there yet, absolutely,” he said, later putting the gap to McLaren and Mercedes at six or seven tenths despite sharing the same engine. That is why, in his view, “the car is much more important for the moment” than making decisions about drivers. Even a top driver can only recover so much lap time if the package is fundamentally short.

That same rebuild, Briatore said, is changing Alpine’s position off the track as well. He described the new Gucci title partnership as one of the biggest deals of his Formula 1 career and said it signals a shift in how the team is seen. “It’s Gucci Alpine, and upgrading the team,” he said. In Monte Carlo on 6 June, he added that Gucci “will change our perception” in the paddock, because Alpine should no longer be viewed simply as a midfield team.