Alpine downfall 'surprising' after strong start - Alonso

Fernando Alonso is 'surprised' by how quickly his former Alpine Formula 1 team have fallen to the back of the field, following a strong 2022.

In the first year of the ground effects regulations, Alpine's A522 machine was a consistent points scorer with Alonso and Esteban Ocon claiming fourth in the Constructors' although reliability failures cost big points finishes.

Alonso opted to leave the team at the end of the year in favour of a multi-year contract that was on offer from Aston Martin, having raced for the Enstone team in three different spells in 2003-2006, 2008-2009 and 2021-2022, taking both his world titles with the team in its Renault guise during that first stint.

Whilst he was careful in his remarks when asked about Alpine's plight after the A524 machine has proved to be slow, overweight and well off the pace after a high turnover of key staff in the last year including CEO, Team Principal, Chief Technical Officer, Technical Director, Sporting Director and Head of Aerodynamics, Alonso did admit his surprise at the situation.

"Well it is difficult to comment from the outside, but it is a team I love and gave me a lot of great things in my career," Alonso told media including RacingNews365.

"So I hope that they can get better.

"Maybe when I was there, obviously the team was maybe different, it was a great atmosphere and we had good performance as well, especially in 2022.

"We were within the top five or six in every race, so it is a little bit surprising to see the current results, but hopefully they can fix things quickly."