Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney are taking their sports success to Formula 1
Hot on the heels of their football success, Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenny are making the jump to Formula 1 to lend some financial support to another underdog. The duo, along with Michael B. Jordan, bought 24% of Alpine Racing, the team announced Monday.
The racing team isn’t even close to Wrexham-levels of underdog, but they’re also far from competitive with the very top teams in Formula 1. Alpine is currently fifth in the team-based Constructors Cup standings, while drivers Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly are eighth and ninth, respectively, out of the 20 Formula 1 drivers.
Before rebranding in 2021, Alpine was known as Renault, and has a storied history in Formula 1 dating back to 1977, with 35 victories in over 400 total races in the sport. The team last saw sustained success in 2005 and 2006, winning both the Constructors’ and Drivers’ Championships with a driving lineup of Fernando Alonso and Giancarlo Fisichella.
Reynolds and McElhenny’s first sporting collaboration came when the duo bought a stake in Wrexham Football Club, an English fifth-tier team. The trials and tribulations of their first season of ownership were covered in the docuseries Welcome to Wrexham, and the team managed to earn promotion to the fourth-tier of English football earlier this year.
As for the reality series tie-ins for Alpine, it seems that Formula 1 and Netflix probably already have that covered with their wildly popular F1 series, Drive to Survive. That being said, Reynolds production company Maximum Effort Investment is focused on storytelling around Alpine so it’s likely we’ll get some extra content from the team one way or another in the near future — may we suggest Bienvenue à Alpine?
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