Alpine has ended its F1 inaugural season with the tenth and final team to unveil their 2023 car.
The Alpine A523 hit the track for the first time during a private test race at Silverstone on Monday, but the French team waited until Thursday to show the car at an event in London.
The car is pinning its hopes on Esteban Ocon and new Alpine employee Pierre Gasly, who will replace Fernando Alonso and create an all-French driver line-up.
Like last year, the team has two liveries for the season, one blue and pink and the other all pink from title sponsor BWT. An all-pink livery will be used for the first three races in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Australia before being changed to blue before the end of the year.
Last year, Alpine passed McLaren to fourth in the standings, taking first place behind three big F1 teams: Red Bull, Ferrari and Mercedes.
Team principal Otmar Szafnauer said the team’s goal this year is to be “much closer to third and further away from fifth than we were before.”
Technical director Matt Harman said the team set ambitious goals this year and made significant changes to a number of components, including changing the rear suspension design from pushrod to pushrod.
He also revealed that the A523 is under the new minimum weight limit of 796kg, meaning Alpine engineers can play with the ballast to optimize the car’s weight distribution for each track.
The A523 passed the 100 km race at Silverstone without any problems, which was held in accordance with the rules of F1 promotional events.
The next time the car will hit the track in Bahrain for the start of pre-season testing on 23 February.
Alpine also used the launch to confirm Australian Formula 2 driver Jack Doohan as a reserve driver.
Source: www.espn.com
