Franco Colapinto position under pressure after Alpine warning

Franco Colapinto's position with Alpine appears to suddenly be under pressure, RacingNews365 understands.

Heading into the Austrian Grand Prix, that did not appear to be the case, but over the weekend at the Red Bull Ring, the feeling is that the situation changed.

Although it is understood Alpine has not been impressed with the pace Colapinto has shown so far, the assumption has been that he would retain his seat beyond the initial five-race plan as proposed by Flavio Briatore when the 22-year-old replaced Jack Doohan.

Briatore, who has taken on the de facto team principal role after the departure of Oliver Oakes, later downplayed the significance of the five-race situation, seemingly taking a degree of pressure off Colapinto. Those five races drew to a close with the grand prix in Austria.

On Saturday, however, Alpine informed Colapinto and his management team that the Argentinian needed to start performing.

Colapinto qualified a reasonable 14th, following on from his 12th on the grid a fortnight previously in Canada, although in Q1 he was a quarter of a second slower than team-mate Pierre Gasly, who went on to reach Q3, with the Frenchman lining up 14th.

In the race, the 22-year-old finished a lap down in 15th, last but one of the classified finishers, with only Red Bull's Yuki Tsunoda behind him.

Colapinto also incurred a five-second penalty for forcing McLaren's Oscar Piastri off track, a punishment that did not affect his position in the classification, but further blotted his copybook for the weekend.

Following the race, the position of Colapinto's management team is unclear but the pressure is there, as was the case with Doohan during his opening six-race stint before being dropped.

Colapinto brushed off his race performance initially. He said: "I, and the team as well, are focusing on improving the car," he said, speaking to the media, including RacingNews365. "We looked a bit weak today, and we just need to take some steps forward.

"The car has been a bit tricky for me to drive at the moment. It's not very consistent. It's quick, but it just didn't give me the confidence I needed to push in the high speed here. It was a tough weekend.

"Overall, we did some steps forward, but it felt like something didn't click."

Asked by RacingNews365 if he had any concerns that Briatore would make a change, he replied: "I'm not really concerned. I think he has been very supportive and he has trust on the decision he's made."