Alpine is concerned about low temperatures and tire granulation

The Alpine team arrived in Las Vegas in good spirits after a double podium finish in Sao Paulo and according to team boss Oliver Oakes the American weekend is off to a positive start. At the first training, Pierre Gasly showed the 9th time, Esteban Ocon – 14th.

“It looks like we’re starting the weekend in Las Vegas on a positive note, but we’ll see how we do the rest of the weekend,” Oakes told Sky Sports. – As you can imagine, there is some concern about low temperatures, and we are already communicating with Pirelli specialists, we want to get their recommendations on how to work effectively with rubber. We will continue to monitor the behavior of the tires under these conditions.

Naturally, the more laps teams can complete in practice, the faster the asphalt surface will disappear, and in this situation it is important to monitor and comply with the process of improving the condition of the track. It is clear that rider confidence will gradually increase.

But so far we see very intensive granulation of rubber, and this also causes some concerns, so this problem still needs to be addressed.”

In 2026, for the first time in the almost half-century history of the Renault factory team, the cars will be equipped with engines from another manufacturer – Alpine will receive from Mercedes not only power plants, but also gearboxes.

When asked what the coming changes would mean for the team, Oakes replied: “It’s obviously an emotional subject because it’s been a full-fledged factory team for a long time. But I think what is happening should be understood as a true declaration of our intentions, of the direction in which we want to move.

It is important that this provides guidelines for ourselves: first of all, we want to build a good chassis. I believe our decision was driven by pragmatic considerations and influenced by a number of factors. “Most importantly, Mercedes makes very efficient engines and we see McLaren winning races with these engines, which is a rare case where the customer team is ahead of the factory team.”