Alpine was going through a very rough patch in 2024, both on and off the track. They needed a strong leadership figure to take charge and get their F1 operation back on track. Enter Flavio Briatore. The Italian businessman made a headline-making return to the sport, taking up the Executive Advisor role at Alpine, and since then, the Enstone outfit has made a decent turnaround.
Briatore, however, feels that they can further improve their performance to become a race-winning and championship-contending outfit as they were back when Michael Schumacher drove for them. Back then, it was the Benetton F1 team led by Briatore himself as its team principal.
The 74-year-old recalled those golden days of the Enstone-based outfit while claiming in a recent interview that Alpine can revive that glory again. “I believe we have the recipe to win with 30 to 40 percent less money than the others. At Benetton, it was 50 percent less. I know this team. That’s why I came back,” Briatore told AMuS.
#OnThisDay in 1995, Michael Schumacher secured his second F1 World Drivers’ Championship at the TI Circuit in Aida, Japan. Here, The Benetton Renault ace celebrates with Luciano Benetton and team boss Flavio Briatore. pic.twitter.com/269W9PIFHn
— Motorsport Images (@MSI_Images) October 22, 2020
Briatore has always been a very smart businessman and that helped him run the Benetton F1 operation quite well. He brought sponsors on board but knew that they would not be able to match the budgets of top teams like Ferrari and McLaren.
Still, Benetton was able to maximize its financial resources to produce a championship-winning car in the mid-1990s. Schumacher was their lead driver, who maximized the potential of those cars to win the drivers’ championship in 1994 and 1995. Benetton also won the Constructors’ title in ’95, which was the only time they won the title under that name.
How the Benetton operation transformed into Renault
In the year 2000, Renault acquired Benetton to become a works team in F1. However, they retained the team that had been successful in the 1990s including Briatore. While Schumacher had moved on to Ferrari, the Italian team principal brought another generational talent named Fernando Alonso on board in 2002.
This was the catalyst of Renault’s golden years in the sport as a works engine outfit. Alonso became the superstar of the sport, clinching the 2005 and 2006 Drivers’ World championships, while the French team won the Constructors’ titles too in both seasons.
Briatore hopes that the Enstone-based outfit can emulate that glory once again under his leadership and guidance, almost two decades after that iconic era. The Alpine F1 team is still the same operation that made Schumacher and Alonso world champions.
Just that, now Briatore has got a fresh driver lineup and newer faces in the technical setup. Pierre Gasly could certainly be the promising leader of the French team, while Jack Doohan learns the ropes in F1 as a rookie. Still, it is going to be a rather tough task this time around for Briatore, as the field is much more competitive than in the ’90s and 2000s.
