Jack Doohan is one of six new Formula One drivers who will start the 2025 season for the first time with a full time drive. He was appointed as Esteban Ocon’s replacement following the summer break and during a year where the French owned squad has been in turmoil.

Alpine began the 2024 campaign with a car that was hugely over weight and despite having drivers who are both Grand Prix winners, the team failed to score a single point over the first five rounds of the year.

Having scored their first point in Miami, the team rolled into Monaco with its first performance upgrades, but the weekend was not to end well as Esteban Ocon collided with his team mate on the red flagged opening lap of the Grand Prix.

 

 

 

 

Alpine start 20924 in chaos

Team boss Bruno Famin was incensed and at the time was live on French TV broadcaster Canal+. His ensuing rant over Ocon’s misjudged manoeuvre threatened “consequences” for his driver, suggesting they would happen quickly. Swift indeed was the response to the French drivers misfortune as he and the team announced they would be parting company at the end of the season.

Soon after, Renault announced they had appointed Flavio Briatore as a ‘super consultant’ to Alpine with executive powers to make decisions even above the team principal’s pay grade. Within weeks the outspoken Bruno Famin was removed from his role as team boss and replaced by the inexperienced Oliver Oakes who had been leading the Hitech F2 and F3 teams.

Oakes was to take up his post following the F1 summer break on starting with the team it had been decided by Briatore that Jack Doohan would be the driver to replace Esteban Ocon. Doohan is managed by Briatore yet this may do him no favours in the long term.

Briatore is slashing costs at Alpine whilst trying to improve performance and to this end it was decided that the Renault brand of F1 power would retire one the new power unit regulations in 2026. Alpine will become a customer of Mercedes buying in the gear box and other associated components, so they can focus their own development work in a more concentrated fashion.

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Doohan junior career unspectacular

Jack Doohan was Alpine’s reserve driver in 2024, travelling to each of the twenty four race weekends in an attempt to groom him for his future in the cockpit. Yet his appointment appeared to lack inspiration, even before Franco Colapinto burst onto the F1 scene replacing Logan Sargeant from the Italian Grand Prix onwards.

Doohan’s junior career for many looks mediocre at best. He has only won two junior karting series in Australia at the age of eleven, the rest of his driving development has never seen the Aussie crowned champion.

Jack’s best season came in 2021, when he came second in the FIA Formula 3 international racing series. Two mid to back of the pack finishes in F2 followed, before in 2023 he finished third in F2 whilst racing for Invicta Virtuoso racing.

When compared to the likes of Charles Leclerc, Oscar Piastri and George Russell and even Mick Schumacher who were all title winners in both F2 & F3, Doohan’s CV always looked particularly weak.

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Abu Dhabi proved little

Of course there will be those who cry cronyism due to the fact Doohan is managed by Briatore, yet the Italian businessman is far too astute to allow that optic to be perceived. In fact given his role to cut costs and improve performance, Briatore would be more likely to cut Doohan if a better option for the team was available.

In fine chaotic Alpine style they axed Esteban Ocon for the final weekend of the 2024 season and replaced him with Doohan. The idea was notionally that giving their soon to be full time driver a full weekend of F1 racing in Abu Dhabi would better prepare him for the start of this season.

Yet for Doohan who qualified last and was just the second last driver classified in the Grand Prix ahead of only Kevin Magnussen who had his race botched up by the Haas F1 team, the weekend appeared to confirm he was no Oliver Bearman or Franco Colapinto. Both these drivers had stepped into F1 as substitutes for Carlos Sainz and Logan Sargeant and impressed paddock observers by scoring points and pressing their team mates.

F1.com pundit and ex-F1 driver Joylon Palmer damned Doohan’s weekend with faint praise. “He didn’t do a lot did he? But he didn’t do a lot wrong either. It’s fine, it’s difficult to parachute someone in for a final race,” said Palmer. “Abu Dhabi is a nice track with big run-offs but I’m looking forward to see what he and all the rookies can do next season.”

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Doohan set performance targets

Meanwhile a young Argentinian had been taking F1 by storm having replaced Logan Sargeant at Williams from the Italian Grand Prix onwards. Franco Colapinto scored in two of his first four races and in qualifying was proving to be a much tougher nut for Alex Albon to crack than his previous team mate.

Despite three huge shunts in Brazil and Mexico, the consensus amongst F1 veteran observers was Colapinto has extraordinary pace and needs more time to refine the rest of his race craft. With interest from Red Bull falling away as the Milton Keynes based teams announced their four driver lineup for this year, it looked for all the world that Colapinto would have to sit out the 2025 season.

Yet throughout the winter rumours continued to abound that Colapinto was on his way to Alpine, which this week was proven to be true. Further, reports in Europe emerged that Doohan has a limited race contract with Alpine, which merely guarantees him between five and six race weekends. This clearly suggests there are performance clauses within the arrangement that wold allow the team to sideline Doohan should he fail to meet expectations.

Given the only true measure of a driver is how he fairing is to compare him to his team mate in almost identical machinery, Doohan will be required to deliver a certain percentage of the finishing positions of his team mate, Pierre Gasly. His overall contribution union to the team’s points should be in excess of 30% for a rookie.

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Qualifying will be key

Qualifying too will be a marker of Jack’s progress as Dr. Helmut Marko has already tasked Liam Lawson with remaining within 3/10ths of a second to his team mate Max Verstappen.

Yet whilst there is a clause which allows the team to replace Doohan with Colapinto, the reverse must be true as well. Should the rookie Aussie deliver on the performance targets set by Alpine, then his contract t will surely protect him from being replaced.

That said, the paddock jury to date appears to favour the view that Doohan is no special new talent, unlike Mercedes’ Kimi Antonelli or even 2024 F2 winner Gabriel Bortoleto. It could well be a tough watch for Australian fans of their countryman, as the year kicks off once again in Melbourne.

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