F1 Insider Sheds Light On Briatore's Role In Alpine Politics As Team Introduces New Principal

Saajan Jogia | Aug 14, 2024

Nov 18, 2023; Las Vegas, Nevada, USA; BWT Alpine F1 driver Pierre Gasly of France (10) drives during the Formula 1 Heineken Silver Las Vegas Grand Prix at the Las Vegas Strip Circuit. Mandatory Credit: Lucas Peltier-USA TODAY Sports / Lucas Peltier-USA TODAY Sports

As Sauber/Audi and Alpine Formula 1 teams announce new team principals to head their teams, Sky Sports F1's Ted Kravitz identifies the contrast in the management structure that will have a different impact on the way each team engages on the political side of the sport.

It was recently announced that Red Bull's sporting director, Jonathan Wheatley, would depart the team after the 2024 season to become the team principal at Sauber/Audi next year. In addition, Audi, which concludes the takeover of the Sauber F1 team in 2026, recently announced a dual management structure as part of its strategy to administer its factory and F1 operations.

The new structure places Wheatley as the team principal, with recently appointed CEO and CTO Mattia Binotto overseeing broader strategic responsibilities. Clear roles and boundaries have been established to prevent potential overlap or conflict. According to Kravitz, Binotto will handle the political aspects of F1, including interactions with F1 management, while Wheatley will focus exclusively on team operations and everything else at that level.

In the case of Alpine, it announced the hiring of Oliver Oakes as team principal during the summer break, who will take over his role at the Dutch Grand Prix. He replaced Bruno Famin, who moved to another role with the parent company Renault. Oakes, who founded the junior team Hitech Grand Prix in 2015, will be the second-youngest team principal in Formula 1 at 36 years old.

Oakes' move to Alpine comes after Flavio Briatore's appointment as Renault CEO Luca de Meo’s executive advisor. Having been actively involved in Formula 1's nitty-gritty in the past, Kravitz revealed that it is unlikely Briatore will get involved on the political side of the sport like Binotto, who will actively engage as the team's face. Speaking on the Sky Sports F1 podcast about Oakes, as reported by Crash.net, he said:

“He’s very much in that club of ambitious, young drivers-turned-team bosses.

“As a team boss he’ll know what makes drivers tick, because he was one.

“He knows how teams are run and in a sense I think he’ll be ok on the political side as well, because what Oakes doesn’t have is somebody directly above him who will be doing all of the political stuff.

“So, Wheatley is team principal, but he has chief executive officer Mattia Binotto directly above him in the Sauber/Audi structure who will be able to do all of the political stuff.

“Oakes is going to have to do all of the politics stuff himself, unless he wants Flavio to do it.

“Being in an F1 Commission meeting or being in the team principals’ [meeting]… Flavio’s not going to turn up to the team principals’ meeting.

“He’s an executive advisor to Renault’s boss. That’s not a position for him to turn up at a team principals’ meeting."

He added:

“Now, if you’re at Sauber/Audi, ok the team principal is Jonathan Wheatley, but the boss of the operation who is taking a higher-level view is Mattia Binotto.

“Mattia Binotto is more use to being at Stefano Domenicali’s team principals’ coffee mornings.

“So, you’d imagine Binotto will get Wheatley to run the Formula 1 team but he’ll be involved at that higher Audi level in representing at that kind of representative level.

“But Oakes is going to have to do that politics thing and quite quickly, whereas we’ll have to wait and see whether Wheatley - who knows more about working in Formula 1, because he’s worked in Formula 1 for many more years than Oliver Oakes has… Wheatley will know more of that, but Wheatley doesn’t know as much about being a race team principal as Oakes does.”