Will Alpine really start at the back of F1's 2024 pecking order?

OPINION: Alpine was usurped in Formula 1's pecking order during 2023 by Aston Martin and McLaren, but a downbeat pre-season test in Bahrain suggests its attentions may be directed rearwards rather than immediately reclaiming its lost ground

"It's not going to be an easy first race, we're not going to start from where we would have liked," Pierre Gasly told Sky at the close of Formula 1's annual pre-season test-athon, not long after stepping out from his evening shift aboard Alpine's new A524 in Bahrain. It was hardly a confidence-inspiring reaction. Given the proclivity for expectations-management throughout pre-season, as the mouthpieces with the largest gravitas wish to save being hoisted upon their own petard, Gasly's comment cut through the testing tentativeness like a hot knife through butter.

The A524 appeared languorous on track throughout testing. Where other cars appear to be wielded like a rapier in some of the more dynamic corners, the Alpine is more akin to fencing with a claymore. Like last year, its Renault power unit is some 30bhp down on everyone else, but the new car looked difficult to handle and the bare-carbon exterior suggests that it might be coming into 2024 carrying extra timber.

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Author Jake Boxall-Legge

Jake Boxall-Legge Autosport’s Technical Editor. Having studied Automotive Engineering with Motorsport at the University of Hertfordshire, West Country-born Jake's original ambition was to design racing cars. During a year between studies in which he accidentally rekindled a love of writing, he took up a Master's in Motorsport Engineering at Oxford Brookes. Halfway through his master's year, he was offered a place on the Autosport Academy, conducting occasional freelance duties before becoming the press officer for Formula 2 and GP3 in 2018. Autosport offered him a return to the fold later that year to serve as its Technical Editor. His voice appears on a number of videos and podcasts, and can often be found writing about terrible Formula 1 cars in excruciating detail. In his spare time, Jake enjoys baking and blames his failure to make it past the Great British Bake-Off interviews on his tenuous grasp on choux pastry. His dream is to open a brunch cafe - and his willingness to make outrageous puns in inappropriate situations has earned him the contempt of his colleagues.