Alonso downplays the first slump of the season at Aston Martin. He attributes seventh in the Spanish GP to the problems on Saturday (the flat bottom was damaged in qualifying and he started eighth on the grid, far from fighting for the podium). “We didn’t have as much rhythm as other Sundays, Neither with the soft nor with the hard did we have those tenths to be with Mercedes. We are a bit ahead of Alpine, from Alpha Tauri. On par perhaps with Ferrari. Lance (Stroll) maintained the difference with Carlos (Sainz) from the first ‘stint’. So we lacked the same rhythm with Red Bull, that half minute that we ended up behind them, but Mercedes is the one that has made the biggest change in rhythm”, Fernando explained after getting out of the car.
Do you worry about the superiority of Mercedes? “It’s a race… in Canada we crush them”, responded to A.S. “I’m leaving happy because qualifying was the Achilles heel of the weekend. After starting so far back I was able to come back, but only up to a certain point. Both Russell and Checo were faster so there wasn’t much to do. We save points. Mercedes added more in terms of manufacturers but we took points from Ferrari, happy on the one hand. In Canada we will carry more things, in Silverstone too. It will depend on who is carrying the upgrades. Even with a normal qualifying we would have had a better chance,” he said.
“It has not been an easy race”
In the end, he did not attack Stroll, sixth: “It was difficult, but we don’t care because they are the same points for the team. Lance drives a ‘top’ race and we have scored more points than Ferrari”. Regarding his overtaking of Ocon: “There is enough straight, nothing has happened. We don’t touch this time (joked). All good. It has not been an easy race, from the start and the degradation we did not know if it was two or three stops. In the end we went to two but there was a lack of rhythm more than anything else. It is normal”.
In any case, it seems like a step back from the five podiums in six races he’s had so far. It doesn’t matter, Saturday (and the lack of evolution) was the cause, he conveys: “With a normal classification we would have been in the front row, you go with the front end, you consume less tires and we do third or fourth. In Miami we weren’t ready for the podium, but we qualified on the front row and you secure the podium. Also in Monaco. We have saved many podiums with a very good Saturday, here we had a very bad Saturday but I am happy and calm”.
