‘They didn’t help us’: Frederic Vasseur rues Ferrari PU reliability issues plaguing Alfa Romeo

At one point of the season, Alfa Romeo were fairly competitive with McLaren and Alpine, but now that has fallen away, and they find themselves 55 points behind fifth-placed McLaren. The fortunate thing for them is that they are clear of Haas currently, and in a somewhat comfortable sixth position.

The pace has not been great lately either, and the team have only scored 1 point since the Canadian Grand Prix, which Guanyu Zhou got for them in the Italian Grand Prix. They have also been often plagued by reliability issues, like their supplier team Ferrari or Haas. While this season is a significant improvement from their last, it could have been even better.

Part of the reason for Alfa Romeo’s better performances at the start of the season was the car’s weight: It was the only car at the weight limit of 798 kilograms, while many others, including Red Bull, were significantly overweight. As car development has gone on, that advantage has faded, and team principal, Frederic Vasseur concedes as much.

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Frederic Vasseur optimistic about upgrade package in Suzuka

Talking to Auto-motor-sport, Frederic Vasseur discussed car development and their targets for the rest of the season. It’ll be some miracle if Alfa Romeo cut the 55-point deficit to McLaren in the last 6 races, and as such, their best hope is to hold on to the sixth place. Vasseur admits to this.

Most cars have lost weight by 3 to 7 kilograms as the season went on, making them faster: “Depending on the savings, that’s three to four-tenths of a second that others have become faster. Always and everywhere. Less weight is the only upgrade that is guaranteed to make a car faster.”

Vasseur says that Alfa Romeo are also ‘under-budget’: “It now shows that we are $10 million under budget. It is one of the most important tasks to close this gap.” and that they have had many reliability issues as well, resulting in engine penalties which put them at a disadvantage already: “That resulted in a lot of starting place penalties, which didn’t exactly help us.”

However, the team now have two fresh engines in the pool, and Frederic Vasseur is optimistic about an aerodynamics package that is supposed to arrive in time for the race in Suzuka, in around three weeks’ time.

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