General
La Gazzetta: 'This team will be Alpine's customer and junior team from 2022'
- GPblog.com
At the end of January last year it was announced that Luca De Meo would become the new CEO of Renault. The 53-year-old Italian has done a lot of work since then, as Cyril Abiteboul had to leave and Renault underwent a name change to Alpine in Formula 1. The next project seems to be snaring Williams as a customer team and junior team.
La Gazzetta dello Sport reported this on Tuesday. The Italian medium writes that Alpine will supply Williams with engines in the pinnacle of motorsport from 2022.
Alpine considers customer team necessary
"The ambitions are great and it is very clear to De Meo, as well as to anyone who understands motorsport, that as long as Alpine is on its own, it will not be able to compete on equal terms with Mercedes, which has three customers (McLaren, Aston Martin, Williams), with Ferrari (Alfa Romeo and Haas) and with Honda (Red Bull and Alpha Tauri)," the paper said. The other engine suppliers will get much more data, making further development easier.
Reportedly, Williams will also become Alpine's junior team, another big advantage. For the French racing team this is of great importance as it currently has no places in Formula 1 where it can release talents (such as Christian Lundgaard and Guanyu Zhou) from their own academy. Competitors like Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari do have these possibilities.
Exit Mercedes
Earlier on it was still Williams' plan to intensify the cooperation with Mercedes. After next season not only the engine but also the gearboxes and other parts would be bought from the German world champion. That deal seems to have been put on hold thanks to the intervention of Alpine.