Fernando Alonso has become frustrated at the Mexican F1 Grand Prix for the sixth time this season, openly questioning the level of preparation of the Alpine F1 team, saying that “bad luck is not enough”.
Fernando Alonso was leading the midfield in the closing stages of the Mexican F1 Grand Prix and was in seventh place before his Renault F1 engine lost a cylinder and retired.
Two-time F1 world champion Fernando Alonso’s body language as he exited his broken-down A522 left no doubt about the anger bubbling under his helmet.
It was Fernando Alonso’s third engine-related DNF in seven races, and he wasn’t just going to stop the failure.
“Car #14 is out. Car #14 always has reliability issues,” Alonso said before explaining his predicament.
“I lost one cylinder in the last 20 laps and was running on cylinder 5 with 20% less power.”
“I was 20 seconds ahead of McLaren and my teammate, so I think the race up to that point was exceptional. I would rate Austin and here as my two best races in terms of speed.”
Again, Fernando Alonso’s points deficit was not resolved.
Alonso added: “At the moment my level is the best of the season and the results and the positions at the end of the year will be one of the worst.”
“So it’s a bit frustrating, but there’s nothing I can do.”
“I lost 60 points this year. Add another six and you have 66. And obviously everyone scores two points more than they should because every other point benefits. It will happen.”
“But yeah, it’s amazing that only one or two cars retire every race, and it’s always car #14.”
“We blew five engines this year, we had qualifying problems in Australia and we couldn’t even start the race because of a blackout in Austria.
“I think in 19 races, more or less 50% of the races, we didn’t get the points we deserved.”
“There’s nothing we can do now.”
The story behind Alpine’s F1 engine reliability problems is well known. Before F1 froze its engine regulations, Renault took a proactive approach to the design of its 2022 power unit, choosing to focus on power and power output and improving reliability in the future.
However, while many engine failures were predictable, the overwhelming majority of reliability problems occurred on Fernando Alonso’s side.
“I don’t think we’re ready,” said Fernando Alonso, brushing off random misfortune.
“The engine can’t finish the race. Changing engines six or seven times like we did and still not finishing the race is bad luck.”
“I think they have work to do next winter, hopefully not too much.”
Alpine F1 team boss Otmar Szafnauer has refuted the driver’s disappointing comments, claiming that only Fernando Alonso had suffered because he was ‘left to chance’.
“It is an engine problem, Esteban’s engine or Fernando’s engine but we are not ready. They are mixed,” said Otmar Szafnauer.
“The odds of something like this happening are non-zero, so it’s possible, but it’s always less than on one side or the other. I think it’s just luck.”
“You can’t find a reason. You can’t say, ‘This set of circumstances is always on Fernando’s side.'”
Sunday’s latest setback further undermined Fernando Alonso’s patience. With Alonso moving to Aston Martin next year, it’s clear the season won’t be over anytime soon.
Asked how the Alpine F1 team would fair at next week’s Brazilian F1 Grand Prix, Fernando Alonso replied: “I don’t care.”
“I’m going to go there, drive as fast as I can, go to Abu Dhabi, celebrate my last race with the team, and then go home.”
Category: F1 / Fernando Alonso / F1 Mexican Grand Prix / Alpine
