After winning the German F4, being a title contender in F3 and winning races in his debut season in F2, the young Frenchman definitely impressed many in the motorsports world. Even with this performance and strong ties with Sauber (Alfa Romeo), he will continue for another season in F2, while the two spots in Alfa Romeo will be occupied by Valtteri Bottas and the driver who finished third in the classification of the 2021 F2 season Guanyu Zhou. The reasoning for that, from Fred Vasseur, the team principal of Alfa Romeo, who has been dealing with a fair share of young drivers along the way was simple - it is safer to keep Pourchaire in F2 instead of moving him up the ladder to F1 too soon. 

As Vasseur explained: “Theo is still staying in F2. We had a long discussion in November, that he did a fantastic season in F2 for the first one but we have also to keep in mind that 18 months ago he was in F4, that the step between F4 and F3 was huge and he did well in F3, the same for the F2.

“He won this season in Monaco but as AlphaTauri’s Franz Tost said during the season, the car is so complex and we have just six test days before the season, it means that it would have been, from my point of view, too risky, too challenging to do the step now. It’s much better to be focused on the championship in F2 next year and we will see the future.

“Theo will for sure do some FP1. We will do some test days that we will try to prepare him for the future, but again, when you are doing the championship in F2, the most important thing is to win the championship and not to prepare the future or something like this, and I will ask him to be champion in F2.”

Will we see Pourchaire in F1 in 2023? Or will he sadly join the list of great drivers that have never had a chance in F1?