New boss of Ryan Reynolds' F1 team issues brutal verdict in first interview

The new boss at Alpine admitted the Formula 1 team is underachieving as he gave an honest assessment of where the outfit stands. In his first interview since starting work as the new managing director at Enstone, Steve Nielsen said the team's results "do not reflect the effort of the people and the facilities we have here".

Alpine sit rock bottom of the constructors' standings with just 20 points scored all season. That is despite being the team with the most famous faces counted within its ownership, with a swathe of top sports icons such as Team Europe Ryder Cup hero Rory McIlroy and NFL superstar Travis Kelce named alongside Wrexham-owning duo Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney as investors.

But all the off-track fanfare has not translated into results with Alpine being held by by several performance factors, not least their underpowered engines. From next year, they will begin to use power units supplied by Mercedes after interim boss Flavio Briatore, officially an adviser to the Renault board that owns the team, chose to shut down their own engine programme.

After finally starting work as the team's new managing director in September, reporting to Briatore, former F1 and FIA sporting director Nielsen has made clear his belief that the current results are not good enough. He said: "We have got great facilities, but the product we put on the track doesn't reflect the effort of the people here and the facilities we have here. My top priority is to make sure that Enstone produces the best car we can."

It has been clear for some time that Alpine are treading water this year in the hope of much more success next term. And Nielsen also pointed to that situation, adding: "You have to have an eye on the future. You have to sacrifice short-term success and invest in the future, and we are going through that at the moment.

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"I am a great believer that you find out more about people when things go badly than when things go well, because you see what people are really made of. There are those people that are willing to dig deep, find an extra gear and keep pushing."

It is a homecoming of sorts for Nielsen, 61, who worked at Enstone for many years over several stints in his earlier career including F1 titles during their Renault era with Fernando Alonso. He added: "It's great to be back. I didn't think I'd know many people here, but there's a mixture of the familiar and the new. It's a really exciting time for me to be back and it's a privilege to be back.

"This is my home - the biggest part of my professional life has been here and my biggest successes I suppose have been here. To come back in this late stage of my career is a real privilege.

"For the last eight years, I haven't been in a racing team. I was at F1 and I had a great time at F1, but you miss the highs and lows that come with competition and, ultimately, that is why I decided to come back, back to my home if you like, because I missed the cut and thrust of competition. So it is wonderful to be back."