Alpine has announced the departures of technical director Matt Harman and head of aerodynamics Dirk de Beer amid a restructuring of its technical department.
Harman and de Beer have both chosen to leave to seek new challenges; their exits coming as Alpine struggles in the early stages of 2024. RACER understands Harman’s departure had already been finalized prior to the pre-season test and the first on-track signs of difficulties, and Alpine is putting a new structure in place moving forward.
Instead of having one technical director, Alpine will now split responsibilities across three roles, with Joe Burnell becoming technical director (engineering), while David Wheater is technical director (aerodynamics) and Ciaron Pilbeam is named technical director (performance).
[lawrence-auto-related count=3 category=1388]
“We have decided to make these organizational changes as we can clearly see that we are not where we want nor need to be in terms of performance level and it is time to take another step in terms of organization and people,” Alpine team principal Bruno Famin said.
“The new three-pillared structure with three technical directors, each specializing in different areas, will bring better work and collaboration across our technical areas and contribute to delivering performance from the factories to the race track. I trust fully in the abilities of Joe, David and Ciaron to work closely together in bringing the team the performance and improvements that it needs.
“Finally, I would like to thank Matt and Dirk for their efforts over the last couple of years at the team and wish them the very best in the next chapter of their careers.”
In making the announcement, Alpine stated: “The decision comes after a period of disappointing results in the FIA Formula 1 World Championship, where the team has fallen from finishing fourth in the 2022 championship to sixth in 2023, missing several key targets in its ambitions to reach the front of the grid.”
Alpine qualified with both cars on the back row at the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix, with Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly finishing 17th and 18th respectively, ahead of only Valtteri Bottas and Logan Sargeant – two cars that both encountered reliability issues and required lengthy stoppages.