As Sauber look to their Audi future, can Alfa Romeo build on their best year in a decade? · RaceFans

Over 30 years since they first joined Formula 1 as one of many plucky privateer teams of the early 1990s, it’s hard to think of a more exciting time for the Sauber team than they enjoy right now.

Off the back of their best season in a decade, grasping onto sixth place by their fingernails, Sauber head into their final year as Alfa Romeo already well on the road to their destiny of becoming Audi’s factory team for 2026. And the impact of that transition is already being felt heading into 2023, over three full seasons before the advent of the new power unit formula.

Change comes at the very top of the team this year. Since 2018, Sauber has run under the steady stewardship of Frederic Vasseur, achieving a range of results varying from solid to unspectacular. Now, Vasseur has been summoned eastwards to bring his calming influence to a chaotic Ferrari team, leaving Alfa Romeo and Sauber under new management for 2023.

In comes former McLaren team principal Andreas Seidl, who does not step into Vasseur’s role but instead assumes the more senior position of Sauber’s CEO. Seidl has history at Hinwil dating back to Sauber’s tenure as BMW’s factory team in the mid-2000s and is appointed with the team’s future as Audi squarely in mind.

Rather than name a new team principal, Sauber have instead revealed managing director Alessandro Alunni Bravi into their newly-created role of ‘team representative’. Carrying out all the duties expected of a team principal at race weekends – such as being interrogated by the media on Saturdays and attending major meetings – Alunni Bravi assumes the helm of a team that feels very much on the ascendency, carried by the momentum of a successful 2022 season.

As the only team to replace both drivers last season, Alfa Romeo took a risk entering into F1’s ground effect era. But it was a gamble that paid off immediately when Valtteri Bottas outqualified the very Mercedes he had only vacated just months prior and secured nine points in the opening race in Bahrain with sixth place – scoring almost as many points as the team had scored across all of 2021.

Bottas arrived at Alfa Romeo neither bitter nor disillusioned from losing his drive at the front of the field but willing to fully embrace the challenge of leading a more modest team. Over the first half of the season, Bottas raked in the points for Alfa Romeo, helping them a high enough tally that would ultimately secure them…