Alpine to assess F1 team orders after Ocon-Alonso Jeddah battle

Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso fought hard for sixth place in the early stages of Sunday’s grand prix in Jeddah.

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Despite the pair nearly colliding on multiple occasions, Szafnauer was pleased the battle remained clean.

“It was fine, it was clean,” Szafnauer said. “It’s what the fans want to see and we told them at the beginning we’ll allow them to race. 

“The only reason I did this was because we were losing a little bit more time than anticipated and that’s I think a little bit because of the track-specific stuff here and a little bit because the cars can follow each other easier now which was the aim of the new regulations and because of it, if you can follow easier you can start overtaking each other one lap after the next.

“They did exactly what we talked about before the race and it was good for everybody as it turned out had Fernando not stopped on track we’d have been sixth and seventh, and we did give the fans a bit of a show and I think that’s what it’s about. You’ve got to let them race.”

Ocon and Alonso’s intense duel ultimately cost them both a significant amount of time to George Russell ahead.

Szafnauer conceded that Alpine might need to assess its use of team orders during the first stint of races to avoid losing crucial time.

“We said that last weekend and we allowed them to race there,” he added. “The only thing we’ve got to do is now assess what DRS does with these cars because you can follow a lot closer. Before it was really easy to brake the DRS train and then off you went. We just have to assess that.”

Szafnauer was then asked about Bottas getting past Ocon after his battle with Alonso died down, he replied: “That’s exactly the type of thing we have to look at. When do we tell them to not start overtaking each other because it does cost the time. That is exactly the trade-off.”

The Alpine boss concluded that it would definitely use team orders if there was no threat from behind and no chance of overtaking anyone in front during the latter part of a grand prix.

“In all my time in F1 when I was in a position to tell the drivers what to do, if at the end of the race, 10 laps to go or even 15 laps to go, there is no value in swapping the two meaning you can’t catch the guy in front of you and nobody behind can catch the two of you, you hold station. 

“But that’s really hard to do at the beginning of the race because you can’t predict what’s going to happen but towards the end of the race, if there’s 10 laps, 15 laps, 20 laps to go, it’s about maximising the team’s points and if hold station means maximising team points, that is what we will do.”

Is Alpine best of the rest?

Alpine had mixed fortunes by the end of the race with Ocon finishing in sixth, while Alonso was forced to retire on Lap 37 after reporting ‘no power’.

“It’s super tight the midfield,” Szafnauer explained. “Happy that Esteban finished best of the rest today and Fernando would have been ahead of him had he not had his problems. So from that regard, we are happy. 

“However, the learning curve on this car is so steep that it’s going to be a development race so we just have to keep adding performance to the car. 

“It is where it is right now but it’s not going to be the same tomorrow unless we add performance, at least the same rate as the others and what we’re trying to do is to add performance at a quicker rate to the others.”