Pierre Gasly was allowed to leave AlphaTauri over concerns for his future in Formula 1 if he stayed, according to team boss Franz Tost.
The Frenchman was involved in a particularly memorable F1 silly season last year, as Alpine's third attempt to sign a driver up for 2023 finally paid off. The team wanted to keep Fernando Alonso but the Spaniard chose to leave, while their original backup plan fell apart when reserve Oscar Piastri turned down the seat and joined McLaren.
So they turned to Gasly, but he was only allowed to leave by AlphaTauri once an exciting enough replacement was secured. Colton Herta had his F1 move blocked by the FIA because he did not have enough points for a superlicence, so the Red Bull operation turned instead to Nyck de Vries.
On top of that replacement search, and the fee AlphaTauri demanded to release Gasly a year early, there was another factor at play. The driver had made it clear he wanted a fresh challenge, after the failure of his first stint with the top Red Bull team and having the door closed to a second attempt.
Gasly talked regularly to reporters about that desire. It was clear he needed a step up from AlphaTauri, and he wasn't going to get that with Red Bull. His now former boss Tost feels that remaining stale for too long might have killed the 26-year-old's F1 career.
"This was the reason why Red Bull decided to release him from the contract," the long-serving team boss told The Race. "Red Bull decided not to take him. And Pierre wanted to go to another team. Because of all these changes with [Sebastian] Vettel stopping, Alonso going to Aston Martin, the seat at Alpine was free.
"Red Bull did something very fair to let him go to Alpine. This was clear for me, because otherwise the risk would have been far too great that he doesn't have a seat for 2024. Then all the cockpits are full. It's not an easy one, but in the end I think it's a fair decision.
"We lose a very experienced driver who brought a lot of success to the team, who helped to build up the team. It will be a loss. There's no doubt about this.
"We have a good relationship and, of course, I was disappointed because I thought he will be with us to the end of 2023. But all the circumstances came together, and then I realised it doesn't make sense [to keep him]. Otherwise, the risk is too high that he hasn't got a good chance in F1 anymore."
