Oakes: People should remember Renault pays the bills

Oakes took over the hot seat at Alpine back in 2024 after the departure of Bruno Famin, who in turn succeeded Szafnauer, who was given the boot abruptly in July 2023 over the weekend of the Belgian Grand Prix along with the team's long-serving sporting director Alan Permane.

It transpired that Szafnauer's departure was the result of the disagreement with Renault CEO Luca de Meo over the time frame required for Alpine to become competitive. That was during the time when Laurent Rossi was CEO of Alpine and had set a 100-race plan for Alpine to start winning races. That would've meant a competitive Alpine in 2024, which was far from the case, and Rossi was sacked before Szafnauer.

In the aftermath of the split, Szafnauer insisted that Renault did not know how to manage Alpine and should've had a hands-off approach at one point, insisting it would take time to bring the team back to the front of the grid.

Szafnauer said at the time: "I always say, you can’t get nine women pregnant and hope you have a baby in a month.

And when later asked about Renault's handling of their F1 outfit, he said: "I think the best thing, and not just Renault but for big car companies to do – and I've seen it a lot, even with car companies that have racing as part of their DNA: they shouldn't meddle.

"Leave it! It's so much different from a car company, you should just leave it to the experts," he insisted.

And while Alpine have not achieved any success yet, they have changed a lot with Famin leaving the team and Oliver Oakes hired, not to mention the sensational return of Flavio Briatore as an executive adviser personally chosen by De Meo.

Now dealing with Renault, Oakes was asked about the comments Szafnauer made; he said: "What I would say is that it's not always one size fits all.

"I think it's fair to say that elements of it are true—and he's [Szafnauer] a good mate; he's been here before—but I think people should also remember who pays the bills and who supports the team. And from my point of view, we're very lucky to have that support.

"It's easy to always point the finger at somebody who's 'meddling', but sometimes you have to ask yourself, well, why do they have to get involved? Is it because we're not handling the stuff? Is it because we really have taken our eye off the ball?

"You can get frustrated at first, but then you step back and you say, 'Actually, we probably should have done that better, but we didn't want to hear that.'

"I don't think there's any need to hide things," Oakes went on. "I don't think there's any need to keep them at arm's length. I think at the end of the day we have to work together. We have to build that trust.

"F1 is a complex business, as is the automotive world, and you can't get it right all the time. I think obviously what's happened before—everyone has their views, their opinions.

"From my side, maybe things are a bit different now. Maybe Luca has more direct contact with me and Flavio. Maybe the team has had to hit a bit of rock bottom to reset.

"I don't know. At the end of the day, none of that is stopping you from making a good race car," the Briton insisted.

As he gears up for his first full season in the Alpine hot seat, the 2025 F1 season, Oakes insists he is shutting out all the distractions and the noise.

He said: "Everybody says to me, do you feel it like a weight on your shoulders or a pressure? And I really see it differently.

"There's no master plan. There's no stuff that's been said before, '100 races' and all that. We just have to get better. We have to be a well-run team.

"And I think we just have to focus on ourselves. And even with all the noise about the power unit and all the talk about selling and all that sort of rubbish, I think people have already seen that we're just not really going to be bothered by that anymore. We're just going to keep our heads down," Oakes concluded.

Alpine finished the 2024 F1 season sixth in the constructors' standings thanks to their double podium at the 2024 Sao Paulo Grand Prix.