Continuing our review of how all ten F1 teams fared in 2023, with a look at Alfa Romeo and drivers Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu.
An Italian icon bows out with a whimper
The team picture
- Constructors standing: P9, 16 points
Perhaps inevitably, the air went out of the Alfa Romeo operation this season as the end of the Italian marque's involvement in F1 loomed. There wasn't much motivation for them to do anything more than merely tread water in the meantime. They managed to score points in four of the first eight races of the season but after that made the top ten only twice more in Italy, and finally in Qatar - which was ironically their best race of the season.
As a result, Alfa Romeo fell from P6 with 55 points in 2022 to P9 and just 16 points this season. Even allowing for the Red Bull dominance at the front, this was a woefully below-par performance for the team, which seems directionless since the departure of former team principal Frederic Vasseur to Ferrari at the start of the year. Alessandro Alunni Bravi took over the retitled role of 'team representative' but it gave the unfortunate impression that he was just there to put the best gloss on the latest result when the TV crews came calling, rather than to lead or take charge of things.
The driver line-up
- Valtteri Bottas: P15, 10 points
- Zhou Guanyu: P8, 6 points
It's not a big surprise that Valtteri Bottas came out in top over his team mate in every significant area in 2023, not just the final position and points tally. Bottas finished in eighth place in the season opener in Bahrain, but Zhou levelled things up in Spain; Bottas then nudged ahead with a point in Canada and thereafter stayed in front for the rest of the season.
Bottas ended up out-qualifying Zhou in 15 of the 22 races (although Bottas was excluded from the results of qualifying at Silverstone for not having enough fuel left at the end). That said, it was surprisingly close in race results: Bottas was ahead of the Chinese driver in 12 outings compared to 9 for Zhou, with neither driver finishing the Sao Paulo GP.
How 2024 is looking for Sauber
With Alfa Romeo departing the F1 scene at the end of the season, where does that leave Sauber (or whatever temporary name they might decide upon) for the next two years before Audi formally takes over at Hinwil? The answer would appear to be marooned in the doldrums. We're not seeing any sense of the team having big plans for 2024, and retaining both Bottas and Zhou further suggests it has been left on auto-pilot for now.
It's hard not to conclude that Sauber will be battling hard again next season simply to avoid the ignominy of the wooden spoon, having finished just four points ahead of Haas this year and behind the likes of AlphaTauri and Williams. The whole story of Alfa Romeo's brief return to F1 seems to be one of low ambition and squandered opportunities.
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