Alpine agrees to early contract release for Piastri

Alpine has agreed to release Oscar Piastri from his contractual obligations to allow the young Australian driver to begin his relationship with McLaren.

Piastri's official transfer to McLaren will come in the wake of an acrimonious split with the French outfit which had earmarked its Alpine Academy member for a promotion to F1 in 2023 as Fernando Alonso's replacement.

However, it later came to light that Piastri had signed a contract with McLaren last summer, a deal disputed by Alpine but eventually validated by the FIA's Contract Recognition Board.

• Read also: Piastri had maiden outing with McLaren at Paul Ricard

Nevertheless, many believed that Alpine would not do Piastri or McLaren any favours by agreeing to the former's early release to the latter.
A private test conducted by McLaren with its new recruit at Paul Ricard recently offered an indication that an agreement had likely been reached between the Woking-based outfit and Alpine, which team boss Otmar Szafnauer confirmed in Brazil this weekend.

"There was a negotiation on an agreement as to how to part ways," said Szafnauer.

"We're drawing a line under it. Once this season ends, he's free to go and do whatever he wants to do."

Although McLaren is set to run Pato O'ward as its young driver in FP1 in Abu Dhabi next week, Piastri will make his official public debut with the Woking-based outfit at F1's post-season young driver test at Yas Marina.

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