Alpine to continue using Viry factory for WEC regardless of F1 engine decision

Alpine’s factory effort in the World Endurance Championship will not be affected by any potential changes to its Formula 1 engine programme.

Alpine Vice President of Motorsport Bruno Famin has stated that the Renault brand will continue to build and maintain engines for the A424 LMDh car at Viry-Chatillon in France for the foreseeable future.

Renault’s Viry factory has been building engines for the Grand Prix since 1979, but the French manufacturer is considering whether to abandon its Formula 1 engine programme ahead of new regulations in 2026.

Although a decision is not expected to be made until September 30, in line with an internal company target, the prospect of Renault ceasing Formula 1 engine production at Viry to transform Alpine into a Mercedes customer team has not been well received by employees, who have protested several times in recent weeks.

But “whatever happens” with the long-running F1 engine programme, the Viry facility will continue to play a key role in Alpine’s Hypercar team, Famin said.

“We are already using the facility for WEC engines. (In) 2025 we will continue with the Formula 1 engine,” he said.

“We certainly use the facilities, the people, the skills and the resources that we have in Viry to support and develop the WEC programme, and we will continue to do so (in the future).”

The Alpine A424 is powered by a heavily modified version of Mecachrome’s 3.4-litre turbocharged V6 engine, which is also used in Formula 2. This is combined with a bespoke hybrid system common to all LMDh cars and supplied jointly by Bosch, Xtrac and Williams Advanced Engineering.

#35 Alpine Endurance Team Alpine A424: Paul-Loup Chatin, Ferdinand Habsburg-Lothringen, Charles Milesi

Photo by: JEP / Motorsport Images

More testing in 2025

Alpine has completed a limited amount of testing ahead of its return to the hypercar class with the all-new A424 in 2024.

It was the only manufacturer in the category not to take part in a collective test in Austin in July, ahead of this month’s Lone Star Le Mans event.

However, Famin has announced that Alpine will ramp up testing in 2025 to take advantage of the full allocation.

“The regulations limit the number of days you can test and the number of days depends on whether you are a manufacturer, but also on the number of customers (cars) you have,” he explained.

“Some competitors have quite a few customer cars and are allowed to do more testing. They also have dual programs with IMSA and WEC.

“We are going step by step and the target for next year will certainly be to use the full quota in terms of the number of testing days that we are going to have.”