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BWT Alpine F1 Team had a disappointing opening weekend for the 2024 season in Bahrain, seeing drivers Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly finish in 17th and 18th place respectively in the race on Saturday.
Both drivers had reflected on Friday after Qualifying that there had been a need for improvements on their cars ahead of the race itself on Saturday and that they needed to maximise the opportunities that arose on the day to gain places.
Ocon began Saturday’s race from P19 on New Softs and then pitted twice for New Hards, on laps 11 and 31 whilst Gasly started from P20 on New Softs and pitted for New Hards on laps 13 and 32.
Ocon commented: “Today was a continuation of what we saw in Qualifying yesterday and, overall, it has not been the weekend we wanted. Most importantly we had a clean race and collected valuable data that we can take into the race in Jeddah next week.”
Gasly added: “We have to keep making steps forward as we are not where we want to be right now. Next week it’s a different track, a new opportunity and a fresh challenge for us to keep showing progress.”
Following on from the results, BWT Alpine F1 Team announced today, 4th march, that there would be organisational changes across the technical teams with a new three-pillared approach. These newly created roles are Technical Director (Performance), Technical Director (Aerodynamics), and Technical Director (Engineering) and will replace the previous singular Technical Director position.
The decision was made after the team fell from 4th place in the 2022 FIA Formula 1 World Championship to 6th place in 2023, missing several key targets in their ambitions to reach the front of grid.
The team announces Joe Burnell as Technical Director (Engineering), David Wheater as Technical Director (Aerodynamics) and Ciaron Pilbeam as Technical Director (Performance). The three will work closely together and report to Team Principal Bruno Famin, with immediate effect.
On a power unit side, the technical team in Viry is led by Technical Director (Power Unit) Eric Meignan who continues to work on the 2026 PU project. The team can also confirm the start of the tenures of Chief Operating Officers John Woods at Enstone and Audrey Vastroux at Viry-Chatillon to continue the development of the factories behind the Formula 1 project. BWT Alpine F1 Team’s Technical Director Matt Harman and Head of Aerodynamics Dirk de Beer have chosen to leave the team to seek new challenges.
Bruno Famin, Team Principal, commented: “We have decided to make these organisational changes as we can clearly see that we are not where we want nor need to be in terms of performance level and it is time to take another step in terms of organisation and people. The new three-pillared structure with three Technical Directors, each specialising in different areas, will bring better work and collaboration across our technical areas and contribute to delivering performance from the factories to the race track.”
