Gallery: Alpine A521 2021 F1 car

After two years away from Formula 1, chasing the motorsport ‘Triple Crown’ (wins at Le Mans, which he managed twice, and victory in the Indy 500, which he failed to grasp), Alonso is back with his former team, although it has changed somewhat since his last stint at Renault from 2008 and 2009. He’ll be joined in Alpine overalls by Frenchman Esteban Ocon, a man who struggled to shine quite as bright as team-mate Daniel Ricciardo in 2020, but a podium towards the end of the season proved he is still worth of a seat.

The second 2021 F1 car launch in one day, the Alpine A521 was revealed just hours after the Mercedes-AMG F1 W12. So far all we’d seen of the Alpine F1 team, formerly Renault F1, is a livery theme, shown in January. It was said at the time that some of the graphic elements would remain, but the livery as a whole would be different. What has changed amounts to the fact that the rear elements of the temporary scheme remain, while from front to back there’s now a blue top with red and black elements underneath.

Sadly the pre-recorded launch was plagued by technical issues, but we were able to hear from the team’s new Racing Director Davide Brivio, as well as Esteban Ocon, executive director Marcin Budkowski, and Alpine CEO Laurent Rossi.