PIASTRI’S 2022 PLAN

Oscar Piastri has outlined to Auto Action the extensive Alpine testing program being planned for 2022 after being named as the reserve driver for the F1 team this year.

After winning the FIA Formula 2 Championship last year, Victorian Piastri will take a year on the sidelines – however he will still be incredibly busy, flying to most races, completing tests in 2021 F1 machinery, and potentially several F1 practice sessions.

“I’ll be pretty busy despite not doing that much driving – we are putting together a big testing programme,” he told AA. “It’ll be quite a lot of days considering it’s F1 testing, and it’s not particularly cheap.

“It’s going to be a good number of days – I’ll be doing some driving in some capacity.

“Probably not any race driving, but the way I’m looking at it, I want to prepare for F1 and for me, there’s not really much relevance in racing anything other than F1.

“I think it’s much more valuable to be doing test days in an F1 car, than then to be racing something else and trying to learn a new trade.”

Due to the major regulation changes in Formula 1 Piastri, will be able to test in last year’s machinery, rather than an F1 car that is a minimum of three years old.

As Piastri explained previously, he was not willing to sever his links with Alpine for a one-year F1 deal, expressing that the loyalty has paid off with the extensive testing program not offered to a youngster for some time.

“Whilst it would have been amazing if I could have been in F1 this year, realistically, I’m not sure it would have been the right move,” he explained to AA.

“Even from the outset, I didn’t have any talks with Alfa. I don’t know if my management did, but I don’t think so.

“I will never have to worry about how that situation would have played out. But there was obviously a lot of other candidates for
that seat, but also I wanted to stay loyal to Alpine as well.

“They’ve been great for me in the last two years, and putting me as reserve driver this year.

“In the last couple of years, there hasn’t been that many young reserve drivers, certainly not many young reserve drivers that are that are the sole driver in that role, so I think that speaks volumes about Alpine’s commitment to me.

“Also putting together this testing programme, … it’s quite substantial. I don’t think it’s a programme that we would have seen for a young driver for quite some time, which is fantastic as well. So for me, it made sense to stay with Alpine, even if it did mean a year on the sidelines.”

At this stage, Piastri is unsure if he will be attending all races as he may be on the sim at the Enstone factory.

“As the reserve driver, obviously, I’ll be physically needed at a lot of the races, certainly all the flyaway races” he said. “We’re still discussing with Alpine what
the plan is for the European races – whether I do sim support on the Friday of each race weekend and then just remain available.

“Whether I do ‘race support’ for some of the European rounds or whether I just attend all the races, regardless of where they are, remains in discussion.”

Piastri may make his practice debut this year if Formula 1 introduces the young driver FP1 sessions spoken about for many months. If they don’t he is unsure if he will take part in a practice session.

“It mainly depends on what’s happening with these young driver FP1s,” he said. “From what I understand, there’s going to be at least a couple so hopefully… I’d like to think that I’ll be in those – I don’t know how many exactly that is yet.

“Two or three would be would be good, but besides that, I don’t really know if there’ll be any more lined up. But certainly, for those young driver FP1s that F1 wants to introduce, I’ll be doing them.”

With Esteban Ocon already signed for 2023 and Fernando unlikely to give up his seat if the car proves to be a front-runner this year, AA asked the 20-year- old if Alpine would assist him in getting a seat with another F1 team.

“To be honest I don’t know,” he said. “It’s very early to start thinking about those kind of situations. I think we’ll get a much better read on that once the season’s begun.

“I’ve made it clear, I want to be on the grid next year, and I feel like I deserve to be. I’m working towards doing everything I can to do that.”

In recent weeks Piastri was also named as the FIA Rookie of the Year after winning the F2 title on debut with an impressive six wins, and four successive Feature races to end the year.

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