Otmar Szafnauer says he was going to show Alpine right into a high three group earlier than his dismissal as group principal, and that the group’s present state of affairs is a “catastrophe.”
Alpine introduced the departures of Szafnauer and long-time sporting director Alan Permane in the course of the 2023 Belgian Grand Prix weekend, with Szafnauer leaving after just below 18 months on the group. Chatting with the Excessive Efficiency podcast, he says he had been conscious of the challenges he would face as soon as he arrived and located your complete group didn’t report back to him, however that he’d remained dedicated as he thought he may flip the state of affairs round.
“I couldn’t have predicted the longer term,” Szafnauer mentioned. “I had a contract, I needed to do the most effective I can for my group, I’m nonetheless working onerous, I’m nonetheless delivering relative to right now. Yeah, we had been sixth in that championship, however we had a few podiums, we had been scoring factors repeatedly, it wasn’t a catastrophe – we had been within the midfield.
“It’s not like right now. I don’t know the place they’re right now, ninth or one thing within the championship? Right this moment it’s a catastrophe. It’s a half step again, however typically you are taking a half step again to take two steps ahead. The recruitment was occurring, good folks had been coming, I used to be going to show that group right into a top-three group which is what we needed to do.
“I used to be working with the FIA on the time to work with the ability unit equalization. We had been 25 horsepower down on energy when the engine freeze occurred, [and] there’s a gentleman’s settlement amongst the engine producers that mentioned if any individual is manner down on energy we’ll enable them to return again up.
“My final assembly, which was a System 1 Fee assembly in Belgium … I put a robust case ahead for permitting Alpine powertrain to return again as much as equal the others. The opposite three had been inside a kilowatt of one another. We’re 15 kilowatts down, 25 horsepower down, it’s onerous to compete. So I used to be engaged on all these fronts to get Alpine higher, and I did it to my final day.”
Szafnauer – who claims he was additionally made a scapegoat within the Oscar Piastri contract saga for errors made earlier than his arrival – says his exit coincided with that of numerous key Alpine personnel that has contributed to the decline in efficiency.
“[I had] System 1 Fee assembly within the morning, and I feel the announcement occurred on the lunchtime that weekend that each Alan Permane and I had been leaving.
“I knew a couple of week earlier than … simply in a telephone name from head of HR, a Zoom name. The top of Renault Group HR.
“I’ve by no means explored these causes. There have been solutions that I wanted to alter the company tradition in a manner that I didn’t assume was the proper technique to do it. I understand how to alter company tradition right into a tradition that has a profitable mentality, psychological security, all the things that I’ve talked about that I used to be on my technique to doing.
“They needed a company tradition change in a special method, to do away with some those who had been doing a very good job that had been there for a very long time, and my thought was in the event you do away with those who do a very good job then the message you ship is, ‘Do a very good job, get fired,’ and that’s not the tradition that you simply really need.
“I used to be requested [to change], and I mentioned no. It’s not who I’m … That will have been short-term. These those who have left truly did a very good job. Most of them are at different groups now, and simply take a look at the outcomes — you possibly can see the distinction … It’s not as a result of I left. There was a mass of those who left.”
