“I think you will be able to buy a Hy4 by 2028”

For the past seven years, Alpine has worked hard to reinvent itself as a premium French performance car manufacturer that can fend off the might of Porsche, Audi and (financial woes aside) Lotus. The reborn A110 has done all the heavy lifting so far, but the announcement of the production A290 at last weekend’s 24 Hours of Le Mans finally set the company’s “garage of dreams” plan (not launched until 2021). in motion.

At the helm of Alpine’s expansion is Philippe Krief, a highly experienced chassis designer whose gold-standard resume includes stints at Michelin, Maserati and Alfa Romeo, and oversaw the development of the Ferrari 458 Speciale while serving as the company’s technical chief. Krief was appointed head of the company only a year ago, inheriting projects such as the A290, the as-yet-unnamed Alpine electric crossover and the EV successor to the A110. But the engineer-turned-CEO has a clear long-term vision for the brand that — spoiler alert — doesn’t rule out future combustion models.

Following the unveiling of the A290, we sat down for a coffee and a chat with Krief in the final hours of another epic edition of Le Mans 24 – a sentiment Alpine probably doesn’t share, given that both of its A424 hypercars have been retired early due to engine problems. . A difficult start to the French marque’s return to the top category of endurance racing, especially when the V6-powered hypercars performed much better than they had all season, but Krief did not seem to be fazed by the team’s problems. “On the one hand, we are quite happy with the performance because the car was fast. On the other hand, we had some reliability issues. We’ll learn from it.”

It’s fair to say that Alpine isn’t having it easy in motorsport in general at the moment. The firm’s new LMDh-based challenger has slowed down in this year’s World Endurance Championship and we all know the struggles the Formula 1 team is going through as rumors swirl about its future. However, for Krief, racing is still crucial to shaping Alpine’s image. “Even though we use different technologies: ICE, hydrogen, electric, in the end we always try to sell more or less the same service. Driving pleasure, lightness for performance and, in the premium segment, a kind of French “savoir faire” (expertise). This is what we’re all about.”

While Alpine sees electric cars as its immediate future, with its trio of “dream garages” all powered by batteries, Krief is keen to stress that he is “open-minded” about alternatives to traditional combustion. This includes burning hydrogen, as demonstrated by its Hy4 (formerly Alpenglow) concept during a demo lap before the big race. At the moment, it’s powered by a 2.0-liter hydrogen combustion engine that produces 340 horsepower (and sounds like ace), but “by October” the concept will be updated to a more powerful V6.

There is only one problem and that is the tank. They are large, heavy and cooled to at least -253 degrees Celsius to keep the hydrogen liquefied. Great for planes and trucks, says Krief, less so for light supercars like the Hy4. “For cars, the tank could be a problem, but there’s some technology emerging that talks about polymorphic forms of tanks (a thermoplastic that becomes an incredibly strong cooled wheel.” That sounds promising, but given how difficult the element is to store and how the filling network has almost dried up, does hydrogen combustion really have a future? “Yes, of course,” Krief says with a smile. could hydrogen combustion also work in cars?

Additionally, there is a real intention to bring the Hy4 into production. “We’re always doing things to make it happen,” says Krief. “Alpenglow is important for styling research, it is important for technology, but it is important for the brand. It’s really important. By doing the Alpenglow, we’re showing that we can play on the big boys’ turf.” Krief is so confident he’ll get the supercar on the road that he has a time frame in mind: “I think if everything goes well [with hydrogen advancements]I think you’ll be able to buy one by 2028.”

So the internal combustion engine isn’t dead for Alpine yet, with the proviso that it can crack the hydrogen mystery. However, the future is certainly electric for the A110. At least “for today,” admits Krief, noting that the sports car’s successor will be built on “a completely new platform developed [in-house].” The platform will bring three models: “The A110, but also the 2+2 and the spider,” he adds, saying the company is already considering a “potential alternative” platform model, suggesting they would be lighter electric sports cars. on the drawing board.

The thing is, it’s hard to see how the A110 can maintain one of its biggest attributes, a curb weight of 1,100 kilograms, while lugging around a bulky battery. While Alpine doesn’t appear to have an ultralight battery solution up its sleeve, Krief believes there are other ways to “perceive lightness”.

“With an electric car, you have more weight, at least today. But first you can try to concentrate the weight, as close to the center of gravity and as low as possible, and that gives you a certain perceived lightness,” he adds. Then there are systems like torque vectoring, as seen on the A290, which can adjust torque delivery and brake “every 10 milliseconds” to help mask excess load. Finally, today’s A110 has “roughly a 200 kilogram advantage” over its main competitors, claims Krief. “This means that even if we increase [the weight]it will always be lighter than the others anyway.”

So while some compromises are inevitable, it sounds like the electric A110 will at least be light by EV standards. What he does not want to imitate, however, are all the feelings of an internal combustion engine. The augmented sound on the new A290, for example, is taken from “everything that spins”, including the electric motor, rather than the internal combustion engine pre-recording. And Hyundai Ioniq 5 N-style fake gears? “It would be too easy for me to take [gears]” says Krief. “I want to take advantage of the EV and I want to do something specific to the EV for the feel and we’re working on some specific things that don’t reproduce the gear changes.” Boo.

We’ll have to wait and see how things pan out with the A290, but there’s no denying that Krief has a strong vision for Alpine’s future. Especially if it means Alpenglow (or whatever it’s called) finds its way into production. All that remains is to resolve the apparent pandemonium in the Formula 1 team. The returning Flavio Briatore should bring an air of calm and rationality, no?