{"id":533641,"date":"2026-03-13T12:05:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T12:05:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/533641\/"},"modified":"2026-03-13T12:05:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T12:05:08","slug":"christian-horners-route-back-to-f1-with-alpine-faces-mercedes-obstacle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/533641\/","title":{"rendered":"Christian Horner&#8217;s route back to F1 with Alpine faces Mercedes obstacle"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Christian Horner&#8217;s interest in buying into Alpine&#8217;s Formula 1 team has been complicated by Mercedes also lodging a bid of its own.<\/p>\n<p>Alpine investors Otro Capital, who bought 24 percent of the team in 2023 for $233 million, are looking to sell their entire stake.<\/p>\n<p>With F1 values rising at unprecedented rates, Otro, a group involving movie stars Ryan Reynolds and Rob Mac alongside golfer Rory McIlroy, look set to make a healthy profit.<\/p>\n<p>Various reports have estimated Alpine&#8217;s overall value to be somewhere in the region of $3 billion.<\/p>\n<p>Former Red Bull boss Horner is known to be one of the interested parties and has put together a consortium of his own, which is in talks with Otro.<\/p>\n<p>Reports this week suggested Mercedes boss Toto Wolff had made a personal bid of his own.<\/p>\n<p>Alpine advisor Flavio Briatore has clarified the situation, confirming interest from Mercedes, but stressing Wolff is not involved in discussions with Otro.<\/p>\n<p><img class=\" lazyload lazyload\" data-image-container=\".inline-photo\" height=\"320\" width=\"570\"\/>Christian Horner has been looking for a route back into Formula 1.\u00a0Kym Illman\/Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Every day is a new situation,&#8221; Briatore said on Friday. &#8220;But what I want to say, I know it&#8217;s the negotiation from Mercedes &#8212; not with Toto, with Mercedes &#8212; and we&#8217;ll see.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t forget, we&#8217;re talking about the Otro shares, nothing to do with Alpine. It&#8217;s the share owned by this hedge fund, it&#8217;s called Otro, American fund. They want to sell the 24 per cent and a few candidates are ready to do the deal.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>When asked if he had any interest in buying the shares himself Briatore, the former part-owner of Queens Park Rangers, said: &#8220;No, no, no, no. Just looking. I&#8217;m just looking what&#8217;s going on and just watching what&#8217;s going on. For us, we have no communication with Toto in this moment. So, if somebody buys the shares, we are very happy.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Alpine was the rebranded name for what used to be Renault&#8217;s factory team, but the French team shut down its engine facility last year.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/racing\/f1\/story\/_\/id\/48175468\/5-questions-hanging-f1-new-regulations-ahead-chinese-grand-prix?referrer=scribe\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">5 questions hanging over F1&#8217;s new regulations ahead of China<\/a><br \/>&#8211; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/f1\/story\/_\/id\/48152827\/chinese-grand-prix-2026-race-f1-sprint-start-s-how-watch-schedule-shanghai-tv-channel-live-stream-predictions-results?referrer=scribe\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Chinese Grand Prix 2026: Race and F1 sprint start times, how to watch<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Alpine moved to a Mercedes power unit supply for 2026, a move Briatore helped facilitate.<\/p>\n<p>When asked if Alpine could guarantee independence in terms of how they vote on key F1 matters if Mercedes became a major stakeholder, Briatore pointed to Red Bull, who also own the Racing Bulls team.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I think so,&#8221; Briatore said. Red Bull has been a pioneer already in the last 10 years or 15 years. And like I tell you, Mercedes is looking to buy Otro&#8217;s 24%. Normally in one company, 75% decide and 25% is the passenger. And this is what is the reality.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Sources have told ESPN there is a fixed date midway through this year for Alpine to decide who Otro sells their stake to.<\/p>\n<p>If a deal is not done before then, Otro has freedom to pick the buyer themselves.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Christian Horner&#8217;s interest in buying into Alpine&#8217;s Formula 1 team has been complicated by Mercedes also lodging a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":533642,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[49,48,578,576,577,82],"class_list":["post-533641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/533641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=533641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/533641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/533642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=533641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=533641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=533641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}