The French team had indeed released a statement announcing the signing of the Australian driver through a clause present in the old agreement between the two parties, without realizing that the clause had expired.
For this reason, Oscar Piastri was forced to clarify the issue before announcing his signing with McLaren. This led to a legal battle that ultimately confirmed the Australian’s version, forcing Alpine to return to the driver market.
Otmar Szafnauer’s Truth
But why didn’t Alpine activate the clause before it expired? Otmar Szafnauer, who was the Team Principal of the French team at the time, addressed the matter in the podcast High Performance. “I had nothing to do with what happened with Oscar Piastri,” the former Team Principal stated. “That mistake was made in November; I arrived in March.” – he pointed out.
“In November, the contract was supposed to be signed but was never signed. When I arrived, I had no idea that the papers hadn’t been properly signed. Oscar Piastri was an academy driver, and in his contract, there was a clause that would allow Alpine to sign him at the end of the Formula 2 season,” Otmar Szafnauer explained.
“That option was never activated in the two weeks it could have been. Later, we issued a statement that had my face on it. So, I had nothing to do with it, but the communications department, which didn’t report to me, decided it was better to relieve pressure from those who had made the mistake by putting my face on the statement.”
“The woman who prepared the statement had worked with me at Force India. When I asked her why she did it, she replied that she had been told to do so,” the Romanian and American engineer revealed. “It wasn’t easy for me. But it helped me understand that there were people at Alpine who didn’t trust me. This means someone was thinking more about their interests than those of the team. And this is unacceptable in Formula 1.” – the 60-year-old concluded.
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