As The Race reports, Franco Colapinto faced an angry reaction from Alpine executive advisor Flavio Briatore after taking out team-mate Pierre Gasly in an Azerbaijan Grand Prix collision. The incident happened following a lock-up at the first safety car restart in Baku, wiping out what should have been a strong points-scoring haul for the squad. Immediately after the race, Briatore had left the door open for extra team sanctions, noting in an official press release that he needed time to consider a course of action to prevent a repeat.
That led straight into an intense trip to Alpine’s Enstone factory, where Colapinto was in the simulator by 5am the following morning to prepare for the Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia. While some suspected the brutal start time was a hidden punishment, it had actually been planned well in advance to help him adjust to the time zone change. Following those simulator runs, Colapinto sat down for heavy discussions with Briatore, managing director Steve Nielsen, racing director Dave Greenwood, and the engineering staff to break down exactly what went wrong.
My message is always the same, that they sometimes don't realise what you can create by writing in your keyword, and that we are humans, and it's not easy for us when we get these kind of things,
Ultimately, cooler heads prevailed. Although Briatore remained unhappy, the team decided to treat the disaster as a lesson learned rather than dropping the hammer with further internal penalties, letting Colapinto off without any action beyond the five-place grid penalty he picked up for Malaysia. Colapinto admitted the talks were tough and that Briatore was furious, but he praised the Italian's leadership and experience in handling the fallout.
Looking at the mechanics of the crash, the actual error was shockingly small. Data showed Colapinto pressed the brake pedal just 2-3% harder than required, which triggered a front lock-up at a moment when he was arriving with significantly more speed. He pointed out that other drivers made the exact same mistake at Turn 1 over the weekend—including Lando Norris and Oscar—it was just his timing that brought devastating consequences for the team's points tally.
The fallout also involved Norris, who initially called for a race ban before apologizing to Colapinto shortly after the race. Colapinto noted that Norris understood the weight of his words, especially given his own past experiences with online vitriol, though Norris unfortunately received a wave of abuse himself afterward. Reflecting on the toxic side of social media, Colapinto addressed the abuse directed at drivers from various fanbases, highlighting that fans often fail to realize the human impact of what they type behind a keyboard.
“My message is always the same, that they sometimes don't realise what you can create by writing in your keyword, and that we are humans, and it's not easy for us when we get these kind of things,” Colapinto said.
