Fernando Alonso is not the kind of Formula One driver to hide his frustration or anger and at times it has been directed towards his Alpine team. Reliability problems for Fernando saw his Alpine car retire in two of the first four races of the 2022 season. Then in Abu Dhabi, Fernando ended his time with the French outfit with his 5th mechanical race retirement of the year.
Despite team mate Ocon only suffering two mechanical failures during a race, Alonso scored a credible 81 points to his team mates 92. Alonso was released to drive for Aston Martin in the Pirelli test following the final race of the season.
Fernando surprised y Aston Martin
Alonso was clearly delighted with his new car stating:
“When I signed for Aston Martin I was 90 percent happy, when they started improving and finished the season on a high I was 100 percent happy, now I’m 100 plus!”
Fernando revealed how the AMR22 differed from the Alpine he’d been driving all season.
“We had some concerns on the steering feedback – at Alpine the first year we had to work a lot for nearly five months on steering assistance and feedback
“We had some concerns that we spoke about in the last few weeks so it was a happy surprise that I felt OK with Aston’s system and we don’t need to change much.
“The shift tones for the gears, for the pitlane, the dash messages when you do a change, how long a message pops up on the dash. You are used to one setup and now you try to accommodate things to see in a more natural way.”
Alonso dig at Alpine reliability
Yet the Spanish world champion appeared delighted with his first outing with Aston Martin and aimed one last salvo at his old French owned team.
Alonso was questioned about reliability after the test, he grinned. “Yeah. When they told me the mileage of the engine on Monday night, I was concerned.
“I said that number is a little bit high for my standards, but we did 97 laps, no problem so it’s outstanding,” Alonso quipped.
Fernando clearly means the Renault power unit when it has accrued as many miles as the Mercedes in the Aston Martin is unreliable. The Brixworth made power unit saw Lewis Hamilton as Mercedes only mechanical retirement at the final race of the season.
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You've got to take your h̶a̶t̶ helmet off to Mark Webber 👏#OnThisDay @AussieGrit bowed out of F1 at the Brazilian Grand Prix 🇧🇷#F1 pic.twitter.com/48plA27cgs
— Formula 1 (@F1) November 24, 2022
Alonso is his own enemy. If he has not had more success, it is his own (un)doing!
He could have kept his mouth shut about various teams he drove for including Ferrari and now Alpine. He criticised the Honda engine as F2 engine. Honda has now shown itself to be the best. It was his loss!
I am a fan of his and I am pained by his self-destruction. It is a pipedream for him to want a third WDC. I expect him to be at the lower end of “the best of the rest”. Alpine were right in wanting to give him only a one-year extension. There are so many young and promising drivers. Someone must tell Alonso not to be a dog in the manger and to get out and make way for the younger hopefuls.