Tost sniffs out retirement
At the end of the current Formula 1 season, Franz Tost will step down as team principal of AlphaTauri. The 67-year-old took the helm at the end of 2005, when the then Scuderia Toro Rosso had taken over Italy’s Minardi. Laurent Mekies is his successor, now assistant team principal of Ferrari.
Franz Tost, the now 67-year-old team principal of Formula 1 team AlphaTauri, will step down from his throne at the end of the current season. After 18 years at the head of the team, which was called Scuderia Toro Rosso when he took office at the end of 2005, it has been good. Still, Tost is not leaving AlphaTauri completely. At least in 2024, he will continue to hold another advisory role.
The new AlphaTauri team principal is Laurent Mekies, current assistant team principal and racing director at the Ferrari team. Mekies was previously involved with Red Bull’s sister team, but left it in 2014 to work at the FIA ​​and has been part of Ferrari since 2018. In 2005, Mekies was even Christijan Albers’ engineer at Minardi, the predecessor of Toro Rosso and AlphaTauri.
AlphaTauri not only welcomes Mekies as a new team principal, but also a new CEO: Peter Bayer. He will take up his new position before the end of the season, to bring a breath of fresh air to AlphaTauri together with Mekies from the start of the 2024 season. The team has only scored 1 point in the championship so far this year, although that is not necessarily due to the current top position holders.
After all, Franz Tost has guided many talents in their development during his long career, including four-time and two-time world champions Sebastian Vettel and Max Verstappen respectively, and is therefore a creditable figure in Formula 1. His goal is to finish fifth with AlphaTauri or Toro Rosso ( or higher) in the Constructors’ Championship, he never made it. Tost is one of the longest-serving F1 team bosses ever.
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– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl