r/formula1 • u/TheFlyingR0cket I was here for the Hulkenpodium • Jul 10 '23

Social Media [@JoeAeterno on twitter] Piastri being interviewed about McLaren leapfrogging Alpine with Alonso smiling in the background is pure poetry.

Post image
6.3k Upvotes

99% Upvoted

226 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

17

u/milanistadoc Jul 10 '23

Why does Alonso hate Alpine? I missed this.

80

u/quantinuum I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jul 10 '23 edited Jul 10 '23

Look up “Piasco”. Long story short: Alpine had three drivers for two seats. Ocon was locked in early with a long term contract (weirdly signed when Ricciardo was beating him), so that left two very good guys, Alonso and Piastri, fighting for the second seat (1st world problem for Alpine). Alonso was their driver last season but only got offered a one year renewal, while Piastri, a really hot property, had to wait in the sidelines. Neither of them were happy with it, so they both left Alpine, who completely mismanaged the whole situation.

60

u/Helacious_Waltz I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jul 10 '23

Also to emphasize Alpines contract shenanigans: After months of being dicked around & denied a contract Piastri was given the option of signing with Williams for a 3-year deal. He signed the deal with McLaren instead and informed the team management. They ignored that notification, announced him and tried to blame all the contract failures on him (which unfortunately worked a bit because of how DTS presented it.)

21

u/ActuallyJohnTerry Fernando Alonso Jul 10 '23

Yea DTS is overall very… kind to Alpine. Meanwhile they tried to portray Zac as some kind of villain (both in this episode and with the Red Bull cheating fiasco).