F1 News: Alpine Chief Reveals Cut-Throat-Thinking Behind Otmar Szafnauer Dismissal

Bruno Famin, vice president of Alpine, has given a frank reasoning behind the abrupt dismissal of team principal Otmar Szafnauer and sporting director Alan Permane.

The French team confirmed the end of the road of Szafnauer and Permane ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix amid ongoing huge shake-ups within the team.

During an appearance on the F1 Nation podcast, Famin confirmed that the decisions were made to benefit the team in the long run. He commented:

"Of course, we get we need a change to share what is going on to see how the situation will evolve but there is absolutely no hurry, and in no way what is going on will affect the immediate performance.

"On the other [hand], everything we're doing is to improve the medium long-term performance."

Famin also revealed that cutting ties with the pair had not been a long-term plan, but their views did not align with that of the teams. He continued:

”I had no real idea because the idea was always to be alongside everybody.

"And as I explained in the conference, if the idea is to really to use all the skills on all the people we have at Enstone and at the end if we have chosen mutually to go for different route with with Alan [Permane] or Otmar [Szafnauer] on the team is because we were not fully aligned.

“The decision has not been taken three months ago. It's a process where we talk about what we need to do to improve the team to go to the phase two of the Alpine in Formula One project.

"Okay, we say we are not aligned enough, right. But, there was no plan.”

There have not been any further announcements of a permanent replacement for Szafnauer, however, it has been rumoured that Mattia Binotto is likely to take the spot after leaving Ferrari at the end of 2022.