{"id":590421,"date":"2026-04-08T14:55:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T14:55:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/590421\/"},"modified":"2026-04-08T14:55:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T14:55:10","slug":"alpine-identifies-key-weakness-holding-back-promising-f1-car","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/590421\/","title":{"rendered":"Alpine identifies key &#8216;weakness&#8217; holding back promising F1 car"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Alpine Managing Director Steve Nielsen has identified what he described as the \u201cbiggest single weakness\u201d on the team\u2019s 2026 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motorsportweek.com\/series\/single-seater\/formula-1\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Formula 1<\/a> challenger.<\/p>\n<p>The A526 has given the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.alpinef1.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Enstone-based squad<\/a> a marked improvement on 2025 already, with Pierre Gasly and Franco Colapinto amassing 16 points after three Grands Prix so far.<\/p>\n<p>Not only is this the same points as Red Bull so far, but is only six points off its total 2025 haul.<\/p>\n<p>An early abandonment of the 2025 car, and early work towards the A526, already shown a huge advantage, but the car also has the added benefit of the Mercedes power unt, having given-up its manufacturer status via Renault.<\/p>\n<p>This has placed the team firmly in contention for midfield supremacy, battling alongside Haas and Racing Bulls.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Steve-Nielsen-Alpine-2026-1024x576.webp.webp\" alt=\"Steve Nielsen has found a key issue with the Alpine 2026 car\" class=\"wp-image-242705\"  \/>Steve Nielsen has found a key issue with the Alpine 2026 car<\/p>\n<p>But Nielsen has spied one area that could be holding back the team from challenging even further, revealing after the Japanese Grand Prix a specific Achilles\u2019 heel.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve got some problems with high-speed understeer, which we need to fix,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHigh-speed changes in direction, that\u2019s probably the biggest single weakness on the car we\u2019ve got this year.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSo we knew coming here, Sector 1 would be tricky, and it is. It manifests itself as understeer. So we have high-speed understeer. We saw some of that in Bahrain.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think that\u2019s the biggest overriding factor, honestly. Other than that, everything\u2019s pretty good, as I say, long runs, high fuel, looks good, looks competitive compared with the people that we\u2019re up against.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>There is no doubt that Alpine is rapidly improving, giving Gasly a vehicle worthy of his talents, particularly after outperforming the A525 several times last season.<\/p>\n<p>But it will need to be vigilant in all areas as its rivals will also be improving as the landscape of the unpredictability that the new regulations cycle brings.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-vivid-red-color has-text-color has-link-color has-medium-font-size wp-elements-2e10c53749258ab2be8d3c67db93000f\">READ MORE \u2013 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motorsportweek.com\/2026\/04\/08\/red-bull-has-burning-fire-to-win-in-f1-again\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Red Bull highlights \u2018burning fire\u2019 to return to winning ways in F1<br \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Alpine Managing Director Steve Nielsen has identified what he described as the \u201cbiggest single weakness\u201d on the team\u2019s&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":590422,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[1035,49,48,578,576,577,82],"class_list":["post-590421","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-alpine","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\/590421","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=590421"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/590421\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/590422"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=590421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=590421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=590421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}