20 April 2023 , 12:49
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Otmar Szafnauer suggested that Alpine could compete with the likes of Mercedes in Baku if its planned upgrades are a success.
The unexpected three-week break between the races in Australia and Azerbaijan has given teams the chance to press on with their car development plans. That includes an Alpine team keen to follow in the footsteps of Aston Martin, who surprised teams this season with their sudden performance leap.
The Silverstone team currently sits second in the constructor's' championship, while Fernando Alonso featured in the podium in all three races. Aston Martin were able to reduce their deficit to Red Bull from around two seconds to what is now closer to half a second in just one winter.
Alpine have been making gains themselves and are looking to move from the top of the midfield into the podium hunt themselves. The French outfit is using Aston Martin as inspiration and Szafnauer revealed significant upgrades which could to be worth up to 0.6s per lap.
"We have put together a great package of updates for the race in Azerbaijan – if our progress is as great as we think, we can compete with Mercedes in Baku," he declared. "We take a lot of updates, but of course, we don't know what Mercedes and others will do.
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"What I do know: our further development is more intensive than last year, and that should pay off on the track. We don't want our development to stop. Last year we already saw that what works well in our wind tunnel also worked really well on the car. Based on that, it looks good for the rest of the season."
Esteban Ocon hopes his Alpine team can follow Aston Martin's lead (AP)Alpine finished above Aston Martin in the 2022 constructors' championship in fourth place, whilst the Silverstone-based team were much further back. But now the French team has fallen behind Aston Martin and is currently sat in P6 after a double DNF in Melbourne.
Esteban Ocon sees Aston Martin's success as nothing more than motivation he can use. He said: "We have to in our mind think it is possible, otherwise there's no point racing. If you think about it, we finished the season in December and when we restarted it was end of February, beginning of March. So it's about three, four months.
"I don't know if Aston would have been able to do so in-season but if you take three or four months, it's not the end of the season. Aston Martin has shown, and fair play to them, that it is possible to make a big step if you find the right things, so it is doable."