While Alpine presented a show car in Paris yesterday, they also issued images of the new A522 chassis which will run for the first time today.
Like all its rival teams, Alpine have had to get to grips with an entirely new set of technical regulations. But within the A522’s carbon fibre exterior lies a heavily revised Renault RE22 power unit – unique to this team, which it says has undergone an extension transformation for the new season.
The distinctive, enlarged engine cover seen on last year’s Alpine is not apparent from the images issued by the team yesterday. Having seemingly followed the lead set by Mercedes with the packaging of its power unit, Renault appear to have allowed Alpine to make noticeable packaging improvements, as technical director Matt Harman indicated at the car’s launch.
In other respects the differences between this year’s car and last are much the same as they are for other teams. The top-down view shows how drastically reduced the bargeboards are,…