Two ex-Formula 1 drivers have sharply criticised Alpine for subjecting rookie Jack Doohan to excessive pressure at the outset of his career.
Even before Doohan drove a metre in 2025, speculation was rife that his contract spanned just six races, with team advisor Flavio Briatore clearly eyeing an earlier switch to Franco Colapinto.
Team principal Oliver Oakes attempted to quell the storm of rumours at Suzuka, where Doohan suffered a major crash, but Ralf Schumacher remains unconvinced. "Sorry, but if you say you don't want to replace Doohan, why are you letting Colapinto drive?" he told Sky Deutschland, pointing to the Argentine reserve's recent test at Monza.
Before his crash, which left him visibly shaken and even injured, Doohan was also sidelined for Suzuka's initial practice in favour of Ryo Hirakawa. "That's a disaster for someone like Doohan on a new track," Schumacher said. "He doesn't feel the support of the team. They could have done the same with (Pierre) Gasly in Bahrain, but they didn't."
Doohan, 22, maintained in Bahrain that he's fully fit, despite needing assistance to exit his car after the Japanese GP.
Former driver Christian Danner partly attributes the ordeal to Alpine. "If he tried that move in the simulator and for some reason it worked, then the engineer has to intervene and tell him 'I strongly advise you not try that in the car'," he said to motorsport-magazin.com, referencing Doohan's ill-fated DRS-open attempt at Turn 1.
"That wasn't done. They let him almost walk into a trap. One could interpret that as making Doohan's life a little harder than it actually needs to be, in the hope that at some point they can say 'I'm sorry, but he's just not good enough'."
