Esteban Ocon Has a New Challenger

Esteban Ocon and Alpine have been a fairly effective pair. Although the team has not put together a world-beating car in his time with them, Alpine has been able to fight at the front of the mid-pack for the past three seasons and Ocon has led the charge. However, despite winning the program its first race since being re-branded as Alpine, he has never been the clear #1 driver.

This is the fourteenth installment of our driver-by-driver preview of the 2023 Formula 1 season. This weekend, we will be covering Alpine. You can find the rest of our previews here.

A tumultuous relationship with former teammate Fernando Alonso ended when Alonso decided to leave for Aston Martin in 2023, but Ocon's time racing next to a comparable talent is hardly over. Former Toro Rosso and AlphaTauri driver Pierre Gasly is joining him in the other Alpine this season, opening the door for another year of uncertain hierarchies.

HOW HE GOT HERE

Ocon was a revelation in his first Formula 3 season, his third season in cars. He beat fellow first-year F3 drivers Tom Blomqvist (now in IMSA with Meyer Shank Racing) and Max Verstappen (now an F1 world champion) on debut in a nine-win season, one that earned him some global attention and a brief test drive appearance with the then-Lotus (now Alpine) team that season. However, while Verstappen got an immediate call-up to F1, Ocon was instead sent to the GP3 series that has since merged with what was once Formula 3 Europe to take the Formula 3 name. He won that championship on debut, too.

Ocon had joined the Mercedes farm system before that GP3 championship season, but Mercedes had no open affiliated seats in F1 for 2016 and no need to see Ocon in Formula 2. They sent him to the DTM instead, where he ran half a season while making some test driver appearances for the then-Renault (now Alpine) team. He finally joined the F1 grid as a driver after the 2016 Summer break, finishing the year out with Manor before earning a prestigious seat at what is now Aston Martin. He put together his statistical best year ever in his first full-time season the next year, finishing eighth in the championship and missing the points just twice. He struggled to 12th in 2018, leading new team owner Lawrence Stroll to pick then-teammate Sergio Perez over him as a lead driver next to his son Lance for 2019.

After a promising start, one bad season left Esteban Ocon out of F1 for 2019.

Ocon instead served as the Mercedes reserve driver in 2020, but a call from what is now Alpine ahead of the 2020 season got him back on the grid. He was handily outscored by Daniel Ricciardo, but he scored points in nine of 17 rounds, more than enough to ensure he returned for 2021. He won his first race that season, and has been committed to Alpine long-term ever since.