Alpine stepped into the Hypercar class in the World Endurance Championship this season with their A424 machine.
The French manufacturer had relatively little experience heading into the season, as Toyota and Ferrari had already competed at the front last year in WEC.
Other teams, such as BMW, were new to the Hypercar class but built valuable experience in IMSA, racing in North America.
Alpine suffered a difficult start with the No. 36 car in particular, failing to score points with that entry in the opening four rounds.
The No. 35 sister car enjoyed a much better start, taking seventh place at the season opener in Qatar before a ninth place at the 6 hours of Imola.
Nicolas Lapierre, who drove the No. 36 car before becoming Alpine’s sporting director, has now told sportscar365 that the campaign met their expectations despite a tricky start and failure to win a race.
Nicolas Lapierre feels Alpine ‘achieved what we wanted to’ after taking fourth in the Manufacturers’ Championship
The French team had a difficult start, which also saw a double retirement at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, which was a difficult episode at their home race.
Alpine began to improve after the lacklustre outing at Le Mans and the subpar unreliability. The No. 36 car scored its first point in Brazil before taking third place at the 6 Hours of Fuji.
Towards the end of the season, Alpine regularly scored points, and Fuji showed they had the potential to fight for podiums. However, they did have a slice of luck, capitalising on other cars failing to finish.
Lapierre explained that fourth in the standings represents a good season for Alpine as well as finishing in front of BMW.
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He said: “It’s good to finish fourth. It was the target when we came here and it was basically also the target at the beginning of the year.
“I feel like we achieved what we wanted to achieve this year, clearly. The first year of the program is a success, even more now with the fourth position in the championship.
“Even though they [BMW] are still running since one year in IMSA, basically the target was to finish in front of them, and this race was quite good.”
Alpine have a lot of work to do to catch Porsche and Toyota
Porsche and Toyota set the benchmark in the World Endurance Championship this season, taking the drivers’ and manufacturers’ titles between them.
They were both consistent over the season and made very few errors, which is critical in such a short eight-round championship.
The French manufacturer lacked raw speed this season and had mechanical issues, but the strong pace at the end of the year should give the team a lift.
Alpine are very keen to keep Mick Schumacher for 2025 as his hopes of returning to Formula 1 continue to fade.