Former Alpine chief Szafnauer claims he had ‘absolutely nothing to do’ with team missing out on signing Piastri

Otmar Szafnauer has stated that he was not responsible for Alpine losing out on Oscar Piastri, with the Australian at the centre of an infamous contract dispute between the French squad and McLaren which saw the Woking outfit secure his services for 2023.

The saga unfolded when – following news of Fernando Alonso’s exit to Aston Martin – Alpine announced one day later in early August 2022 that Piastri would race for the team during the subsequent season, the youngster having been a member of their academy programme.

TIMELINE: How the Oscar Piastri saga unfolded

However, just two hours later Piastri himself wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that he would not be driving for Alpine and that the announcement had been made without his permission (see below). It soon became clear that Piastri had instead agreed a contract with McLaren.

The dispute was subsequently examined by the Contract Recognition Board (CRB), who ruled that McLaren’s deal with Piastri – which had been signed in July – was the valid one. Alpine went on to recruit Pierre Gasly to join the team as Esteban Ocon’s team mate, while Piastri has continued his ascent with the papaya outfit.

Szafnauer was Team Principal at Alpine during the contract debacle, before departing his role after the 2023 Belgian Grand Prix. Reflecting on the situation during an appearance on the High Performance Podcast, Szafnauer alleged that he became aware of some issues at the team after joining in early 2022.

“There’s a few things that went wrong at Alpine, one of which was I didn’t have control over the entire team,” the 60-year-old said.

“So, for example, I knew straight away, HR didn’t report to me – [they] reported up through France. The finance office didn’t report to me – [they] reported up through France. The communications department didn’t report to me, and the marketing group/commercial didn’t report to me, and that in itself I knew was going to be problematic."

Pushed on whether he was aware of this before taking up the position, Szafnauer continued: “No. Before I took the job, it was ‘everybody’s reporting to me’ – I get there and that’s not the case.

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“And I knew at the beginning… I thought I could manage it, but I knew it’s problematic, and I remember I had absolutely nothing to do with not signing Oscar Piastri correctly. That mistake was made in November [2021] – I started in March [2022].

“In November, the Piastri contract was meant to be signed – it was never signed. I started [in] March, I had no idea. They didn’t submit the CRB documents correctly and never signed a contract with him.”

Szafnauer went on to criticise Alpine for the way in which he felt they handled the situation following the CRB decision over Piastri’s contract.

“Come the CRB where Alpine lost because the filings were incorrectly done, we put out a press release and the press release has my image on it,” the former team boss said.

“So, number one, nothing to do with me – I wasn’t even there – but, number two, the communications department that didn’t report to me thought it was a good idea to deflect the incompetency of those that were Alpine at the time by putting my picture on the release.”

Despite the fallout from the situation, Szafnauer believes that Alpine still ultimately delivered on what was promised in Piastri’s contract, even if the deal was not signed.

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“Although they didn’t sign the contract in time, what was in that contract we delivered to Oscar, and that was not insignificant,” he added. “It was 5,000km in a two-year-old car – that costs you a lot of money.

“And we did that, we absolutely did everything that was meant to be done by that contract that was never signed. In English law, had we taken it to an English court, maybe we would have won.

“That’s unjust enrichment – yeah, you didn’t sign the contract, but you took all this and you’re not delivering what you’re supposed to deliver.”