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Szafnauer discusses contract: If I was the CEO of McLaren...

Szafnauer discusses contract: "If I was the CEO of McLaren..."

20-02-2023 07:00
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It all happened rather suddenly: Fernando Alonso announced he would leave Alpine. This rolled into one of the biggest F1 driver contract stories in the history of the sport. In the end, Alpine didn't get Oscar Piastri but Pierre Gasly instead. We now know who Alpine were considering and Otmar Szafnauer is confident Alpine have walked away with the better driver in comparison to their rivals McLaren

Contract negotiations

Netflix's Drive to Survive reminded us that Alpine were considering Daniel Ricciardo, Gasly, and Nico Hulkenberg. It seems they wanted an experianced driver placed alongside Esteban Ocon. It was acknowledged that Ricciardo upset members of the team when he left Alpine [Renault at the time] to move to McLaren a couple of years earlier. 

The team decided to go with Gasly. A Grand Prix winner who has over 100 Grands Prix under his belt and still has the potential to grow further at a new team. Alpine were very happy with this in the end, but for a long time there was a dispute with McLaren which almost ended in a court battle and a lawsuit. That was avoided and both parties could move on. The Alpine boss Szafnauer actually feels like he ended up with the better option. 

"With Oscar not coming to our team and appointing Pierre Gasly that could work out even better. There's no need for a lawsuit. I am just happy we have two top drivers. Knowing what I know now and looking back on everything that has happened, if I was the CEO of McLaren, I would've taken Pierre Gasly," Szafnauer told the Netflix cameras. 

GPblog recieved early access to season 5 of Drive to Survive which will be available from February 24.