After months of speculation, it was relatively unsurprising when Franco Colapinto replaced Jack Doohan mid-season.
Alpine’s multi-year contract with the Argentine, which was signed in January, indicated their confidence in his abilities and potential for growth.
What was unexpected, however, is when Alpine only guaranteed Colapinto five-races with the team.
Like Doohan before him, the 22-year-old must deliver strong performances in a very short time frame.
This is despite his significant contract with Team Enstone, which required Alpine paying a substantial fee to Williams to break him from his existing contract.
With all this considered, the latest comments from Flavio Briatore add another variable to the equation.
Colapinto must perform to keep Alpine seat
As mentioned previously, Alpine put in a lot of effort to sign Colapinto from Williams.
The French team’s interest was first reported towards the end of 2024, before reaching an agreement at the beginning of this year.
It was this deal with Colapinto, signed in January, that put Jack Doohan under pressure even before round one in Australia.
Because of this, it was seen as somewhat inevitable that the Australian would lose his seat after a handful of rounds – regardless of performance.
Colapinto, however, was not anticipated to be under the microscope upon arrival at the Enstone-based outfit.
Despite the team’s significant investment in signing and promoting him mid-season, Alpine are not committing to keeping Colapinto in the car for the remainder of 2025:
“Franco Colapinto — we need to wait one second to judge Franco,” he told the media in Spain.
“Monte Carlo, it was very boring and very annoying. Let’s see. This is the first real race of Franco.
“Races [how many Colapinto will drive for Alpine] I don’t know, honestly.
“I never tell five races, three races, four races, one race. We see.
“If Colapinto is performing he’s driving the car. If not, we’ll see.
“2025 is a year we need to prepare ourselves for 2026. So whatever experiment I need doing, we’re doing.
“I don’t know at this moment if Franco will stay for the season or not, but let’s see. Depends on the performance.
“We’re only looking at the performance — nothing else.”
Thrown into the deep end
It was just under a year ago that Franco Colapinto was put alongside Alex Albon at Williams mid-season.
The 22-year-old showed impressive speed and adaptability to score points on a handful of occasions – even outqualifying his more experienced teammate more than once.
So far at Alpine, however, luck has not been on his side.
His engine failure in qualifying for the Spanish GP was just the newest page in Colapinto’s difficult F1 return, which has proved more difficult than the team anticipated.
Colapinto has undoubtedly shown he is capable of delivering at a high level and fighting for points, which he did in similar circumstances at Williams last year.
Of course, he was not under constant threat of being replaced when he was at James Vowles’ team.
This is a very real danger at Alpine, who have a large pool of reserve drivers at their disposal.
Arguably the most senior of these reserves is Paul Aron, who finished third in last year’s Formula 2 Championship.
To be clear, it would be premature to suggest that Colapinto is destined for the same fate as Jack Doohan.
His contract with the team goes beyond this season, which makes a swap before the end of 2025 unlikely.
Still, just because another driver swap is improbable does not make it impossible – as Alpine and Flavio Briatore have proven numerous times.
Main photo: Sam Bagnall/Sutton Images (via Alpine media gallery)
