Ahead of last week's Belgian Grand Prix Alpine dismissed team boss Szafnauer and long-time sporting manager Alan Permane, just a week on from Renault CEO Luca de Meo replacing Laurent Rossi with Philippe Krief as the Alpine brand's CEO.
This move was explained by incoming interim team principal Bruno Famin as Szafnauer "not being on the same timeline" as Alpine on how fast its march to the front of the F1 grid is progressing amid a disappointing 2023 season.
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And despite Alpine not even being midway through a five-year or 100-race plan to fight for the world championship, its upper management decided to pull the trigger on a second round of personnel changes, with Szafnauer only lasting 18 months into the job after taking over from Abiteboul.
Now a team boss in WRC with Hyundai, Abiteboul was replaced by Rossi at the start of 2021 when the Renault team was rebranded as Alpine. He believes Rossi's 100-race plan to get to the front was flawed from the start.
"The plan to quantify 100 grands prix... why not 120, why not 80? I don't understand it," Abiteboul told France Info.
"When you start putting forward a plan like that, you're sure to get it wrong because you don't know what others are doing in Formula 1.
"Aston Martin's colossal investments, Red Bull's incredible momentum, none of that is going to stop just because Laurent Rossi's 99th grand prix came along."
Source: Autosport