Alpine's new floor upgrade 'a step in the right direction', says team's CTO

Fernando Alonso of Spain driving the (14) Alpine F1 A522 Renault on track during the F1 Grand Prix of Australia at Melbourne Grand Prix Circuit on April 10, 2022 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Mark Thompson/Getty Images)
Fernando Alonso of Spain driving the (14) Alpine F1 A522 Renault on track during the F1 Grand Prix of Australia at Melbourne Grand Prix Circuit on April 10, 2022 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Mark Thompson/Getty Images)

Alpine F1 team’s technical chief Pat Fry revealed that the team will be bringing a new floor upgrade to Imola. However, the chief technical officer mentioned that the floor will be tested on Friday during the practice sessions before implementing it for the entire weekend.

Speaking in a team preview about the new upgrade, Fry said:

“We, like everyone, are trying to develop the car as quickly as possible. We’re working through bringing weight saving items to the car when and where we can."
"Although it’s a Sprint race weekend we still have a new floor upgrade that we will test, so we’ll see how that fares in the sole Friday practice session. It’s a step in the right direction and it will be interesting to see how it performs on track.”

Alpine showed some good pace in Australia in qualifying and were even quicker than Mercedes in the race, had it not been for some bad luck. In qualifying Fernando Alonso’s fastest lap was good enough to be in top three until he crashed and the safety car in the race compromised their chances of a top five finish.

Alpine F1 team principal Otmar Szfanauer explained that a 2.6 dollar part caused the qualifying crash in Australia. However, the American-Romanian also believes they are confident they can give their Spanish champion a car to fight at the front in the 2022 season.


Alpine expect their upgrade to work at the Imola GP

Alpine F1 team’s sporting director Alan Permane expects their new floor upgrade to work at Imola. The Briton mentioned that the upgrade was initially to be brought to Miami but was preponed to the Imola circuit. However, the British engineer feels their pace at Imola will be similar to Melbourne and they expect to perform better.

Speaking to the F1 Nation podcast about their upgrade, Permane said:

"We’ve got a nice upgrade coming in Imola. We have a new floor; I think that’ll just be for one car at the moment. It was planned for Miami, and we’ve managed to pull it forward for Imola, so I’m very confident there. It might be a little track specific [for pace]."
"We struggled a bit in Bahrain, and here [Melbourne], we’ve been pretty happy. So let’s see. I don’t think Imola is too dissimilar to here. There’s some high-speed corners, change of direction, that sort of thing – so we’re looking forward to going.”

After the Australian GP result, Alpine are currently fifth in the standings with a total of 22 points and are trailing McLaren by two points. Despite their misfortune, the French outfit have shown promising signs of being able to punch above their current spot if their car improves and their reliability issues are sorted.

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Edited by Arnav Kholkar