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Alpine frustrations and lack of clarity led to Ocon’s Haas switch
Frustration with a lack of improvement at Alpine was one of the main reasons Esteban Ocon opted to make the switch to Haas, where the Frenchman sees a clear set of future plans.
Ocon announced earlier this year that he would be leaving Alpine at the end of this season following five years with the team, with his move to Haas confirmed ahead of the summer break. Amid discussions to close down Renault’s power unit program and with a third team principal in a many years set to start work at Alpine, the team has been unsettled for some time and the technical issues stood out to Ocon as particularly frustrating.
“The decision for me was quite clear quite a long time ago that I wanted a new challenge,” Ocon said. “I wanted to write my own story, and obviously five years in Formula 1 with the same team is a long time in Formula 1 terms.
“We’ve achieved good things; we’ve achieved things a little bit more difficult at times, but yes for sure this season has been frustrating. It’s not a secret to anyone -- no one’s happy inside the team with where we are, and there hasn’t been enough of an improvement on some terms and on some technical issues that we had years ago.
“That circle of technical development and improvement, we haven’t been on top of that and we are facing the issues that we had three years ago with the current car, which is not possible in terms of the Formula 1 world.
“But I wish this team the best. We have achieved together my first podium, my first win, and it’s always going to remain special to my heart. I wish them the best for the future but before that we still have a half a season to finish and I hope that I can do my best to finish on a high with this team.”
In contrast, Ocon says he was impressed by the clear vision that Haas team principal Ayao Komatsu has for the coming years, as well as the more recent examples of progress that have resulted in Haas climbing to seventh in the constructors’ championship.
“There’s been a lot of conversations going around the paddock, that is quite clear," he said. "These conversations started quite a long time ago -- mid-season of 2023 is really when they started, but Ayao really convinced me with his words. He’s a person that has a lot of experience in Formula 1, that I’ve been working with from my first steps into Formula 1 as well when I was testing for the first time 10 years ago, and I even know him from a lot longer than that.
“So when we sat down for the first time he explained to me his plans going forward, which were very clear. They [Haas] have a clear target, which is still in humble terms -- not showing off, which is what I like as well, but they have very clear plans of improving and they are already starting that, as you can see this year.
“They have been clearly improving their performance, the car itself, and the plans are obviously quite big and quite impressive looking forwards. So it was a decision that I obviously took that I’m very happy with and I’m very excited.”
Chris Medland
While studying Sports Journalism at the University of Central Lancashire, Chris managed to talk his way into working at the British Grand Prix in 2008 and was retained for three years before joining ESPN F1 as Assistant Editor. After three further years at ESPN, a spell as F1 Editor at Crash Media Group was followed by the major task of launching F1i.com’s English-language website and running it as Editor. Present at every race since the start of 2014, he has continued building his freelance portfolio, working with international titles. As well as writing for RACER, his broadcast work includes television appearances on F1 TV and as a presenter and reporter on North America's live radio coverage on SiriusXM.
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