The Japanese Grand Prix allowed Fernando Alonso to return to the points after two consecutive retirements, but that did not make the Alpine driver finish the race satisfied. Now, his team has responded to his words.
Fernando Alonso He finished the Japanese Grand Prix last Sunday at Suzuka in seventh place, thus ending a streak of two consecutive retirements and helping Alpine regain fourth place in the constructors’ championship.
However, Fernando Alonso expressed his discomfort at the end of the race, pointing out that the team had not been up to the task at a strategic level.
“We saw Zhou stop and he was 5 seconds a lap quicker. We were like, ‘Okay, let’s do that.
According to the Asturian, Alpine “he made the wrong decisions all the time”, emphasizing that «first, we stopped the last ones to put the intermediate ones and we lost positions; then we stopped too late for the second stop, with six laps to go, and I ended up in the same place I was.
Alan Permane responds to Fernando Alonso
Alpine’s sports director, and an old acquaintance of Fernando Alonso from his time at Renault, has been in charge of responding to the questions raised by journalists after his driver’s complaints.
Alan Permane has pointed out that, “If the race had gone the distance we thought it was going to go, would he have caught Sebastian (Vettel)? Yes. So, probably we should have done it a little earlier. Although it is not easy to predict it, because in addition his tires were also leaving at the end of the stint.
The British engineer refers to career direction decision of not respecting the rule of taking an additional lap once the maximum time has been reached. A lap that would have been enough for Fernando Alonso to beat a Sebastian Vettel who beat him at the finish line by only 11 thousandths.
“In hindsight yes, we could have (stopped earlier). But I don’t think we realized how easy it was going to be to overtake people. We talked to him and he commented, “Should we think about pitting?”. And he would have had to overtake five cars, so we thought it wouldn’t be a good thing to do,” explained Permane.
“And then I think we saw Zhou stop, and he was 5 seconds a lap quicker. we told each other, “Okay yeah, let’s do that”. We will have to study what happened, but I am clear that if the race had lasted one more lap, as I think it should have, he would have been ahead of Sebastian », the Briton concluded.
Be that as it may, Fernando Alonso feels that he missed a great opportunity to obtain a very good result, as his teammate Estaban Ocon finished the race in fourth position.
Photos: Alpine F1 Team