“It was 70 laps of qualifying”: Fernando Alonso opens up on a ‘demanding’ Dutch GP
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Fernando Alonso
Fernando Alonso has been having a great season. While he is still 7 points behind Esteban Ocon, a lot of that is down to a slow start. Alonso retired twice in the first four races of the season, finishing in the points once in Bahrain, but since then he’s gone on a great run of points finishes.
At this stage of the season, only Max Verstappen has a longer (unbroken) streak of points finishes than Fernando Alonso. While Verstappen has scored points in every race since Imola, Alonso has done so in every race since Spain. In Zandvoort, he had another fantastic result, finishing P6 after starting P13, albeit a hard-fought one. As per Motorsport, he explained that he could not relax in the race at all.
Alonso said: “It was good, it was 70 laps of qualifying today because we could not relax at any point. The start was good, but I lost places on the outside of Turn 1, so I had to fight very hard to recover some, then we put the hard and we had to push very hard to make that middle stint work.”
Fernando Alonso chipper with gaining positions twice in a row from Ferrari penalties
Fernando Alonso also said that the race did not have even a single relaxing period: “And then when we thought that it was a more relaxed part of the race at the end with a good freshness of tyre, it came to the safety car and we have to fight again all the last 12 laps. It was a very demanding race for sure.”
The race was notable for not one, but two pitstop incidents for Carlos Sainz. The first time around, a misplaced left rear tyre meant that he had to stay stationary an extra 10 seconds. In the second one, on being released from the stop, Sainz almost clattered into Alonso, earning him an unsafe-release penalty, which he called a ‘joke’. This penalty helped the senior Spaniard gain a position.
Alonso said: “I knew that Carlos had the five seconds penalty, so I didn’t want that they fight too hard and they put me in problems with the car behind. It was a good race and obviously, I know the position gained at the end, we did it in Spa, one spot from Ferrari and one here also from Ferrari. So we gain always one position!”
In Belgium, it had been Charles Leclerc who had received the penalty for speeding in the pitlane. The penalty wouldn’t have affected his result if Ferrari did not choose to pit him again for the fastest lap point that he didn’t even get. As for Fernando Alonso, he will go to Monza with a spring in his step from all the great results.
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Aniket Tripathi
(1002 Articles Published)