There are few available drives left for Formula 1’s 2026 season. Red Bull’s poisoned-chalice second seat alongside Max Verstappen remains open, as the team works out what to do with Yuki Tsunoda, and the consequences of filling that seat will extend to the Racing Bulls operation. Mercedes also does not have drivers under contract for next year, but will retain George Russell and Andrea Kimi Antonelli for 2026. Alpine has the only other vacancy.
Although the Alpine lead driver spot was never in doubt – Pierre Gasly was already signed up for next year before extending his contract to the end of 2028 – the occupant of the second seat remains undecided.
After Steve Nielsen started work as managing director at the start of September, the extension of Gasly followed reasonably swiftly; now, the next item on the Briton’s in-tray is to identify his partner for next year.
Since its experiments with inexperienced drivers this season have not been entirely successful, as Jack Doohan and Franco Colapinto have shared the seat and are yet to score points, Alpine is considering whether to stick or twist with its approach.
There is a lack of experienced options available, so Alpine may be forced to stick with youth. Valtteri Bottas and Sergio Perez made contact with Alpine but, as they were advanced in Cadillac contract talks, they were never truly close to signing with the Enstone team. Along with the usual suspects, there are a couple of candidates who could be available depending on how contract talks progress elsewhere.
Let’s take a look at Alpine’s main 2026 options.
The most likely choice: Franco Colapinto
Franco Colapinto, Alpine
Photo by: Bryn Lennon / Formula 1 via Getty Images
This would represent the safe option for Alpine. Briatore has hinted that the team might have tried to rush the Argentine a bit too much, with too much pressure on his shoulders after coming in for Jack Doohan after Miami.
“Last year he did very well. But maybe to be in the team with a good driver like Pierre, and always in competition with the team-mate, maybe we put too much pressure on him,” Briatore explained at Zandvoort. “I think we need to consider that. The driver is a human being and we need to understand what’s going on in the heads of these kids. These are young kids and I think it’s our mistake to underestimate the human part of the driver. We’re always looking at the timing. Maybe I missed something in the management [of Colapinto].”
Colapinto landed at Williams with no expectation on his shoulders and performed admirably, but began to rack up the crashes; although last year’s FW46 was sometimes difficult at the rear, Colapinto may have started to listen to the hype. Moving to Alpine in a reserve role very much felt like a certain precursor to a full-time drive before too long, and so it proved when Doohan was demoted after six races.
But it’s not been easy going. Colapinto shunted first time out during qualifying at Imola, and has yet to figure within the top 10. Results have started to come to him, however, and finishing 11th at Zandvoort put him within touching distance of an all-important point. His qualifying head-to-head with Gasly now stands at 7-3, which isn’t too bad, but he’s not quite been the explosive presence that last year’s performances had demonstrated. He’s not been a clear step up on Doohan.
The ‘we got it wrong’ choice: Jack Doohan
Jack Doohan, Alpine
Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images
It’s unlikely that Alpine will go crawling back to Doohan, but we’ll keep him in the ring for now. One suspects that, if the team really felt the Australian was worth pursuing, it would have reinstated him to the line-up at Colapinto’s expense…unless marketing forces/pride had been at stake.
That said, Doohan probably didn’t get a fair crack of the whip. There were too many crashes, yes, but Colapinto has ensured the same misfortune since replacing him – he’s just compartmentalised his shunts in less critical parts of the weekend. It seemed that Doohan was on the up, however; he’d drawn level with Gasly at 3-3 in grand prix qualifying sessions in Miami, but coalesced with Liam Lawson at the first corner to bring his race to an early end.
Although Doohan hadn’t been exactly stellar in those six races, it never felt like he was set up to succeed. But perhaps Alpine had already seen enough through TPC runs and through the first quarter of the season: he was a capable driver, but not one with the spark it was looking for. Either way, it will continue to assess the Queenslander and determine whether it made the right choice earlier this year. A route back does, however, look unlikely.
The left-field choice: Paul Aron
Flavio Briatore, Executive Advisor of Alpine F1 talks with Paul Aron.
Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Sutton Images via Getty Images
The so-far under-utilised third prong in the Alpine youngster trident, Aron was one of Ollie Oakes’ signings before Oakes resigned as team principal, having impressed at the Briton’s Hitech team.
That the Estonian has stuck around suggests that he’s earned some credit in the bank through his simulator runs, and was loaned out to Sauber for two FP1 runs in place of Nico Hulkenberg before deputising for Colapinto in FP1 at Monza in his first Alpine run. He was on the pace in his Sauber runs, albeit with his second outing in Hungary curtailed by a powertrain issue. He was the 0.5s off Gasly’s best time in Monza’s FP1 session.
Aron led some of last year’s F2 title race before losing ground to Gabriel Bortoleto and Isack Hadjar, although the idea that he kept such strong company rather suggests he could hack it in F1 if given the chance. Rumour has it that he’s also displayed good pace in TPC runs, and must surely be worthy of consideration if Colapinto doesn’t quite gather momentum over the rest of 2025.
The experienced choice: Yuki Tsunoda or Liam Lawson
Liam Lawson, Racing Bulls Team, Yuki Tsunoda, Red Bull Racing Team
Photo by: Joe Portlock / LAT Images via Getty Images
It’s very likely that one driver is going to be jettisoned from the Red Bull ecosystem at the end of the year, as Arvid Lindblad becomes more strongly linked with a Racing Bulls debut next season. Further shuffling is likely if Isack Hadjar ends up with a Red Bull promotion.
Thus, it depends on who’s more likely to lose out between Yuki Tsunoda and Liam Lawson. If Alpine felt that its rookie-based experimentation wasn’t getting anywhere, then either would pose a known-quantity option. Towards the end of their time as team-mates, Tsunoda was on terms with Gasly, while Lawson was also considered to be a match for Tsunoda at times. However, their hopes of thriving at Red Bull were dealt a blow by their difficulties with a capricious RB21 chassis.
Either would be a sensible option for Alpine for 2026. Gasly may well be inclined to support Tsunoda’s credentials considering that the two got on well during their AlphaTauri days, although Briatore may be an appreciator of Lawson’s hard-headed approach to racing as the Kiwi continues his rehabilitation from a bruising two races at Red Bull.
The “Moneyball” choice: Leonardo Fornaroli
Podium: Race winner Leonardo Fornaroli, Invicta Racing
Photo by: Formula Motorsport Ltd
If the Italian’s not in contention for an Alpine drive, then he very much should be. After winning the F3 title without a victory to his name (his consistency very much keeping him above his series counterparts), Fornaroli has kicked on and racked up four wins in F2 as he seeks to become the next back-to-back winner of the F1 junior categories.
Currently, the Piacenza-born driver is following a similar career trajectory to Gabriel Bortoleto: F3 win with Trident, and now leading the F2 standings with Invicta. Remarkably, Fornaroli remains a free agent when it comes to F1 junior-team status, a quirk that has his Invicta team principal James Robinson puzzled.
“It’s absolutely mind-blowing that he hasn’t been announced for an F1 role for next year already, given that if you think most of the other drivers in the top seven or eight positions in the championship are part of F1 team academies,” Robinson told Autosport.
“I think Leo is a bit of a Moneyball-type pick. He doesn’t do the big banzai moves that some drivers do. He doesn’t do silly dances on the podium. He’s not very outspoken in the media. But having worked in Formula 1 for 20 years, knowing what F1 teams look for in drivers, Leo is an exceptional guy in terms of developing a car.”
If Alpine continues to look at youth over experience for 2026, Fornaroli’s title success(es, probably) should put him at the top of that list.
Anyone else?
Whenever there’s an F1 vacancy, this man is often linked to it…
Photo by: Alexander Trienitz
Alpine’s other junior racers – Kush Maini and Gabriele Mini – have not been particularly impressive in F2 this season. Alpine World Endurance Championship driver Mick Schumacher has, however, been touted as an option for the F1 team, although Briatore told Auto Motor und Sport that Schumacher was “not on our list” for 2026.
Alpine also has Ferdinand Habsburg, Charles Milesi, Fred Makowiecki, Jules Gounon, and Paul-Loup Chatin on its books, but none of them have the Schumacher surname and thus are nowhere near F1 seat discourse. Fellow ‘son-of’ Gounon cannot count on the nostalgia of father Jean-Marc’s results at Minardi and Simtek, for example.
Elsewhere in F2, Luke Browning and Alex Dunne have been wildly impressive in their first seasons in the championship, while they’re tied up to the Williams and McLaren junior programmes respectively, they surely have release options if an F1 seat emerges.
Had Mercedes succeeded in luring Max Verstappen to its team for 2026, paddock whispers had suggested that Antonelli may have been set for an Alpine loan deal – potentially knocking off a few quid off next year’s powertrain deal. This door is now closed, however, given Verstappen’s commitment to Red Bull.
Read the full article here