Franco Colapinto, with high and low in the Austria GP

The Argentine pilot penó with the lack of potential of his Alpine, found a good rhythm after his second stop, suffered a blow of Yuki Tsunoda and ended up sanctioned by a maneuver with Oscar Piestri.

Franco Colapinto closed just that so -fifth race with Alpine, the border that the team had imposed at the time of announcing it as a replacement for Jack Doohan after the Miami GP. With the continuity already insured since before starting the activity of the GP of Austria, 11th Calendar event, the Argentine pilot lived a true roller coaster during the competition.

First, he had to fight again with the lazy A525 of Alpine, a car that is far from being able to think, to add points. In a race in which there were four dropouts and in which Pierre Gasly laid from the tenth drawer, the flag of paintings found the cars of Estone in the 13th position, with the French, and 15º, to Colapinto. In fact, with the eighth place of Gabriel Bortoleto in Spielberg, Franco is the only 20 corridor that integrates the grill that did not score in 2025.

From Alpine, according to Gasly in the previous one, they are already thinking about the 2026 car (there will be new technical regulations) and the car they have now is the one they will have until the end of the year. “The problem is that we have to defend ourselves all the time,” Franco said before starting the competition. Given what the Frenchman said, the road will continue to be tortuous and perhaps we have to wait for a career revolted by a chaparrón or something weird to think about getting higher.

Franco began in Austria with soft tires, a strategy with which Alpine engineers tried to alleviate the disadvantage they know they have. But it didn’t work. After the arrest, Franco was placed half -, hard tires. Colapinto struggled with those covers, although in Tour 18 he was the fastest pilot of all. But he did not find rhythm and, to top it off, he received a sulf of Yuki Tsuonda in the third curve. The Japanese, whose position in Red Bull is becoming increasingly unsustainable (taking into account the policy used by the Milton Keynes team), threw inside, where there was no space, and hit him in the right rear wheel. The Argentine made a complete spin and could continue. Undoubtedly, some damage remained in the A525.

The best thing about the Argentine was at the Stint with hard tires. He turned consistently faster than Gasly. In fact, the fastest turn of the Argentine was 1M09S621, against 1m10s151 of the French. Colapinto completed five laps below 70 seconds. His rhythm was better than that of Gasly, who at some point came to ask the team the possibility of leaving because he could not carry the car on the track. “I am close to spinning in each curve,” former Alpha Touri bramed.

In that roller coaster that was Austria, Franco also made a rude mistake. In full battle with Tsunoda, already on Tour 54, Oscar Piastri arrived, the second of the race. The Argentine focused only on the Japanese and did not look at anything else. When the Australian threw it to pass it, the Alpine pilot closed the way and threw McLaren into the grass. That situation was resolved with a penalty of five seconds and one point in the superliccence for collapint.

It passed just Franco’s fifth in Alpine and in just five days the sixth will begin in Silverstone. The A525 will remain the same and the English track is very fast. The benefits of the French car are not an invitation to think about a big difference with respect to what it lived in Canada and Austria. “We are going to reset and,” said Colapinto before finishing his passage through Spielberg. Meanwhile, the team is getting further among the builders because Sauber’s improvement continues to reap points. The Swiss added 20 points in the last two dates and already took Alpine 15, which is sailed in the background.