全部回帖
Started: 7th Finished: 6th
QUALIFYING
Ocon said he was on the “back foot” all weekend and suspected a car problem was the reason for being a clear step behind Alonso on pace regardless of the conditions.
Time lost in the chicanes was particularly noticeable thanks to a lack of rear grip and left him 1.6s off Alonso.
RACE
Other than being passed by Russell early on, gave nothing away on his way to sixth place.
He stopped under the second VSC and the safety car, a strategy that allowed him to jump Alonso thanks to his team-mate’s long first stint.
Verdict: Executed his race well but not at Alonso’s level despite finishing ahead.
Started: 2nd Finished: 9th
QUALIFYING
Excelled throughout qualifying, with his final lap earning him a place on the front row for the first time since the 2012 German Grand Prix.
He described that last lap as “all-in”, taking a few risks along the way and ending up a tenth-and-a-half clear of Sainz. But as he put it, Verstappen was “in another league” and any chance of pole had vanished by the time Alonso exited Turn 4 given the time lost.
RACE
Having promised to challenge for the lead at the start, an average launch meant he had to settle for second, which became third when Sainz passed him.
Alonso held his own until an MGU-K related power unit problem slowed him. That, combined with missing the second VSC through a quirk of timing and running long, meant the race got away from him. Took seventh on the road, but earned himself a justified five-second penalty by weaving in front of Bottas on the last lap.
Verdict: On inspired form, but the penalty was needlessly self-inflicted.
Edd Straw's 2022 Canadian Grand Prix F1 driver ratings - The Race (the-race.com)
Started: 7th Finished: 6th
QUALIFYING
Ocon said he was on the “back foot” all weekend and suspected a car problem was the reason for being a clear step behind Alonso on pace regardless of the conditions.
Time lost in the chicanes was particularly noticeable thanks to a lack of rear grip and left him 1.6s off Alonso.
RACE
Other than being passed by Russell early on, gave nothing away on his way to sixth place.
He stopped under the second VSC and the safety car, a strategy that allowed him to jump Alonso thanks to his team-mate’s long first stint.
Verdict: Executed his race well but not at Alonso’s level despite finishing ahead.
Started: 2nd Finished: 9th
QUALIFYING
Excelled throughout qualifying, with his final lap earning him a place on the front row for the first time since the 2012 German Grand Prix.
He described that last lap as “all-in”, taking a few risks along the way and ending up a tenth-and-a-half clear of Sainz. But as he put it, Verstappen was “in another league” and any chance of pole had vanished by the time Alonso exited Turn 4 given the time lost.
RACE
Having promised to challenge for the lead at the start, an average launch meant he had to settle for second, which became third when Sainz passed him.
Alonso held his own until an MGU-K related power unit problem slowed him. That, combined with missing the second VSC through a quirk of timing and running long, meant the race got away from him. Took seventh on the road, but earned himself a justified five-second penalty by weaving in front of Bottas on the last lap.
Verdict: On inspired form, but the penalty was needlessly self-inflicted.
Edd Straw's 2022 Canadian Grand Prix F1 driver ratings - The Race (the-race.com)
MARK HUGHES: A CORNER-BY-CORNER LOOK AT ALONSO’S TERRIFIC LAP
Jun 19 2022
By Mark Hughes
Seeing Fernando Alonso, at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, sliding through the final corner in the dying moments of wet qualifying gave a wonderful visceral sense of what the timing screens would confirm a few seconds later as he qualified the Alpine on the front row at 40 years old. He’d out-run time yet again.
It was a quite brilliant performance, at least as good as the mega lap he never got to complete for red flags in Melbourne. The track was wet but drying, a line going down at some places but standing water at others, the grip unknowable as you approached the corners each lap. In these conditions requiring improvisation, nerve and the confidence of knowing you could always rescue whatever crisis your striving might initiate, Alonso stepped forward.
Yes, he was a 0.65s slower than pole-sitter Max Verstappen but in a car which in the dry is usually over 1s adrift of the Red Bull. He edged out Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari and shaded his own super-capable team mate Esteban Ocon by 1.5s.
Around Montreal the Alpine was probably better than its usual level. The team has been making good progress with it of late, both in better understanding it and with productive upgrades, which have given Alonso a balance he can work with. It had been quick in the dry practices of Friday too, green track or rubbered-in, single lap or long runs, full-wet track as in FP3 or drying as in qualifying.
But it is Alonso who has been really maximising the car and who pounced on the extra opportunity provided by the weather of ambushing everyone. Much of the paddock was figuratively shaking their heads in knowing amazement. He’d pulled something special out the bag yet again.
Alpine also retains in its DNA the savvy race operations of a world title-winning team. Before his final two-lap Q3 run, Alonso was held for a long time after he was ready, ensuring that they got him across the line to begin his final lap as late as possible on the drying track and into a good gap.
A mist of spray from the cars on the pit straight is hanging in the air as he drives down the pitlane. His race engineer Karel Loos guides him about the gaps to other cars as Fernando feels his way around the latest grip levels. Harnessing 1,000 horsepower in conditions such as these is always going to be a game of wheelspin, snaps of power oversteer and trying to somehow find traction.
Even as Alonso is talking to Loos, the engine revs can be heard wildly flaring up as the rear wheels find the standing water, especially out of Turn 2 and the Turn 10 hairpin. Look after your tyres, bring the brakes up to temperature. This will be a two-lap run. Brakes up to temperature as he approaches the final chicane, but back off, don’t start the lap yet; there are yellows at Turn 1. Ok, they’ve cleared, recharge off, go.
There’s a big puddle on the apex of Turn 1. The edge of it is the new apex. But there’s a little bit too much speed into T2, a big snap of oversteer, off the gas for an age. Even then another flurry of wheelspin further up the road where the surface is still treacherous. Delicate and precise through the perilously narrow dry line at Turns 4-5, high-speed, the walls up close.
At this point Alonso feels it’s not building into a great lap and asks if there is time to convert it to a prep lap for the final attack lap. Yes, there’s a margin of 30s, he’s told. So they go through the routine again, recharge back on, but keep the brake and tyre temperatures while letting any push-lap cars speed past. Approaching the final chicane, recharge off, away he goes for the final lap. There’s wheelspin onto the pit straight.
Compared to Verstappen and Sainz, Alonso is a little earlier on the brakes for T1 than either and loses a little time on entry. But he’s briefly ahead of both of them by the apex.
Through Turn 1, he’s using a lot of throttle to help with the rotation of the car to line it up for T2, to balance out the understeer with power. He’s briefly using around 50% throttle there, about twice as much as Verstappen. That achieved, he takes a calmer approach into Turn 2 this time, off the gas a long time but that gets him straight as early as possible for maximum traction.
Both the Ferrari and Red Bull have better traction though and are back ahead by around three tenths even before the braking begins for Turn 3, the tight right-hander where the track dives away from the St Lawrence and down an understeer-inducing drop to the left of Turn 4 where hard walls lie in menacing wait on the exit.
He’s audacious through here, an angry power slide with the rear tyre walls virtually touching the wall, but short-shifting and not lifting anywhere near as much as Verstappen who has his own little moment through here where the overhanging trees and the earth bank on the left are keeping the track wet.
Despite a brief and sudden lift for a lairy moment in the kink of Turn 5, Alonso claws back two of those three tenths to Verstappen between Turns 3 and 6 to be just 0.1s down by the end of Sector 1, though Sainz has had a great run through there and has the fastest sector time of all, 0.315s up on Alonso.
The chatter of the underfloor skimming the track can be heard in the Alpine cockpit as the speed builds before Alonso is hard on the brakes for the tight left of Turn 6. He carries a lot of momentum in, the camber of the turn making it faster than it looks and again he short-shifts but still there’s angry power oversteer to catch and this costs him time to both the Red Bull and Ferrari.
Despite a lovely clean exit out of Turn 7, leaving the wooded depression behind and heading for the chicane of T8-9, the lost momentum from that wheelspin out of T6 keeps on costing him all the way down to the chicane. By the end of sector 2 in the braking zone for the hairpin he’s around 0.5s behind them. Which would seem to be about right for an Alpine halfway through the lap.
He takes a gentle arc into the hairpin, a wide line to get the car straight asap and he takes time from both Verstappen and Sainz here. But despite being absolutely aligned as the tyres find the standing water just beyond the exit, there’s wild fourth-gear wheelspin and again it seems as if the Red Bull and Ferrari just have naturally better traction. So he’s not as quick as either through the speed trap at the end of the straight.Verstappen, running maybe 15s ahead of Alonso on the road, completes a super-tidy, impressive and fast lap. Alonso is risking everything with his approach to the chicane, outrageously early off the brakes and carrying a load of momentum into there. He just about coaxes it to the first apex but is already busy on steering and throttle as he slides spectacularly out of there, champion’s wall lying in wait, and then makes a run for the line. A few seconds behind, Sainz is also adventurous into the chicane but the slide loses him much more momentum than did Alonso’s. In that moment Sainz loses the 0.5s advantage he had over the Alpine and is shaded by a tenth over the lap.
Like that, Alonso gets his first front row in a decade.
“I think [Red Bull] are in a different league, for sure,” he said afterwards. “It was not in our wildest dreams to be on pole position. And so we take the first row and that’s maybe better than any expectation.”
In the age versus experience equation, Alonso will tell you the latter is very valuable and the former doesn’t have any effect yet. Not for him.
“The car felt good from the first laps in FP1 so that was a help to build the confidence. It’s also a circuit that I think you need some rhythm into it. You use a lot of kerb riding here and it’s quite bumpy.
“There are a few things that, you know, are there for many, many years. And I guess for half of the grid it’s either the first time they come here or the second time… I’ve been racing here 16 or 17 years so as I always said, age and experience is always a help, it’s never a downside.”
The thrill and attack of Alonso in full flight doesn’t look any different today to how it was in his title-winning glory years. It would seem to feel like that from inside too. “It was very difficult to execute qualifying because we were a little bit blind on what are the times and which position we were.
“We were not informed because every lap you were improving one or two seconds so I think it was too much of a change constantly on the times. So yeah, it was all-in for sure, on the last lap. It was completely unexpected, the grip that you will get on the following corner so you have to guess and you have to go for it.
“And yeah, I wanted to put in a good lap and everything was fine.”
Mark Hughes: A corner-by-corner look at Alonso's terrific lap - The Race (the-race.com)
MARK HUGHES: A CORNER-BY-CORNER LOOK AT ALONSO’S TERRIFIC LAP
Jun 19 2022
By Mark Hughes
Seeing Fernando Alonso, at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, sliding through the final corner in the dying moments of wet qualifying gave a wonderful visceral sense of what the timing screens would confirm a few seconds later as he qualified the Alpine on the front row at 40 years old. He’d out-run time yet again.
It was a quite brilliant performance, at least as good as the mega lap he never got to complete for red flags in Melbourne. The track was wet but drying, a line going down at some places but standing water at others, the grip unknowable as you approached the corners each lap. In these conditions requiring improvisation, nerve and the confidence of knowing you could always rescue whatever crisis your striving might initiate, Alonso stepped forward.
Yes, he was a 0.65s slower than pole-sitter Max Verstappen but in a car which in the dry is usually over 1s adrift of the Red Bull. He edged out Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari and shaded his own super-capable team mate Esteban Ocon by 1.5s.
Around Montreal the Alpine was probably better than its usual level. The team has been making good progress with it of late, both in better understanding it and with productive upgrades, which have given Alonso a balance he can work with. It had been quick in the dry practices of Friday too, green track or rubbered-in, single lap or long runs, full-wet track as in FP3 or drying as in qualifying.
But it is Alonso who has been really maximising the car and who pounced on the extra opportunity provided by the weather of ambushing everyone. Much of the paddock was figuratively shaking their heads in knowing amazement. He’d pulled something special out the bag yet again.
Alpine also retains in its DNA the savvy race operations of a world title-winning team. Before his final two-lap Q3 run, Alonso was held for a long time after he was ready, ensuring that they got him across the line to begin his final lap as late as possible on the drying track and into a good gap.
A mist of spray from the cars on the pit straight is hanging in the air as he drives down the pitlane. His race engineer Karel Loos guides him about the gaps to other cars as Fernando feels his way around the latest grip levels. Harnessing 1,000 horsepower in conditions such as these is always going to be a game of wheelspin, snaps of power oversteer and trying to somehow find traction.
Even as Alonso is talking to Loos, the engine revs can be heard wildly flaring up as the rear wheels find the standing water, especially out of Turn 2 and the Turn 10 hairpin. Look after your tyres, bring the brakes up to temperature. This will be a two-lap run. Brakes up to temperature as he approaches the final chicane, but back off, don’t start the lap yet; there are yellows at Turn 1. Ok, they’ve cleared, recharge off, go.
There’s a big puddle on the apex of Turn 1. The edge of it is the new apex. But there’s a little bit too much speed into T2, a big snap of oversteer, off the gas for an age. Even then another flurry of wheelspin further up the road where the surface is still treacherous. Delicate and precise through the perilously narrow dry line at Turns 4-5, high-speed, the walls up close.
At this point Alonso feels it’s not building into a great lap and asks if there is time to convert it to a prep lap for the final attack lap. Yes, there’s a margin of 30s, he’s told. So they go through the routine again, recharge back on, but keep the brake and tyre temperatures while letting any push-lap cars speed past. Approaching the final chicane, recharge off, away he goes for the final lap. There’s wheelspin onto the pit straight.
Compared to Verstappen and Sainz, Alonso is a little earlier on the brakes for T1 than either and loses a little time on entry. But he’s briefly ahead of both of them by the apex.
Through Turn 1, he’s using a lot of throttle to help with the rotation of the car to line it up for T2, to balance out the understeer with power. He’s briefly using around 50% throttle there, about twice as much as Verstappen. That achieved, he takes a calmer approach into Turn 2 this time, off the gas a long time but that gets him straight as early as possible for maximum traction.
Both the Ferrari and Red Bull have better traction though and are back ahead by around three tenths even before the braking begins for Turn 3, the tight right-hander where the track dives away from the St Lawrence and down an understeer-inducing drop to the left of Turn 4 where hard walls lie in menacing wait on the exit.
He’s audacious through here, an angry power slide with the rear tyre walls virtually touching the wall, but short-shifting and not lifting anywhere near as much as Verstappen who has his own little moment through here where the overhanging trees and the earth bank on the left are keeping the track wet.
Despite a brief and sudden lift for a lairy moment in the kink of Turn 5, Alonso claws back two of those three tenths to Verstappen between Turns 3 and 6 to be just 0.1s down by the end of Sector 1, though Sainz has had a great run through there and has the fastest sector time of all, 0.315s up on Alonso.
The chatter of the underfloor skimming the track can be heard in the Alpine cockpit as the speed builds before Alonso is hard on the brakes for the tight left of Turn 6. He carries a lot of momentum in, the camber of the turn making it faster than it looks and again he short-shifts but still there’s angry power oversteer to catch and this costs him time to both the Red Bull and Ferrari.
Despite a lovely clean exit out of Turn 7, leaving the wooded depression behind and heading for the chicane of T8-9, the lost momentum from that wheelspin out of T6 keeps on costing him all the way down to the chicane. By the end of sector 2 in the braking zone for the hairpin he’s around 0.5s behind them. Which would seem to be about right for an Alpine halfway through the lap.
He takes a gentle arc into the hairpin, a wide line to get the car straight asap and he takes time from both Verstappen and Sainz here. But despite being absolutely aligned as the tyres find the standing water just beyond the exit, there’s wild fourth-gear wheelspin and again it seems as if the Red Bull and Ferrari just have naturally better traction. So he’s not as quick as either through the speed trap at the end of the straight.Verstappen, running maybe 15s ahead of Alonso on the road, completes a super-tidy, impressive and fast lap. Alonso is risking everything with his approach to the chicane, outrageously early off the brakes and carrying a load of momentum into there. He just about coaxes it to the first apex but is already busy on steering and throttle as he slides spectacularly out of there, champion’s wall lying in wait, and then makes a run for the line. A few seconds behind, Sainz is also adventurous into the chicane but the slide loses him much more momentum than did Alonso’s. In that moment Sainz loses the 0.5s advantage he had over the Alpine and is shaded by a tenth over the lap.
Like that, Alonso gets his first front row in a decade.
“I think [Red Bull] are in a different league, for sure,” he said afterwards. “It was not in our wildest dreams to be on pole position. And so we take the first row and that’s maybe better than any expectation.”
In the age versus experience equation, Alonso will tell you the latter is very valuable and the former doesn’t have any effect yet. Not for him.
“The car felt good from the first laps in FP1 so that was a help to build the confidence. It’s also a circuit that I think you need some rhythm into it. You use a lot of kerb riding here and it’s quite bumpy.
“There are a few things that, you know, are there for many, many years. And I guess for half of the grid it’s either the first time they come here or the second time… I’ve been racing here 16 or 17 years so as I always said, age and experience is always a help, it’s never a downside.”
The thrill and attack of Alonso in full flight doesn’t look any different today to how it was in his title-winning glory years. It would seem to feel like that from inside too. “It was very difficult to execute qualifying because we were a little bit blind on what are the times and which position we were.
“We were not informed because every lap you were improving one or two seconds so I think it was too much of a change constantly on the times. So yeah, it was all-in for sure, on the last lap. It was completely unexpected, the grip that you will get on the following corner so you have to guess and you have to go for it.
“And yeah, I wanted to put in a good lap and everything was fine.”
Mark Hughes: A corner-by-corner look at Alonso's terrific lap - The Race (the-race.com)
CANADIAN GP PENALTY FOR WEAVING COSTS ALONSO TWO PLACES
Fernando Alonso has been handed a five-second penalty that drops him from seventh to ninth place in the Canadian Grand Prix after he was found to have changed direction too many times.
Front-row starter Alonso was defending seventh from Valtteri Bottas in the closing laps of the race, but his movements while attempting to keep the position on the penultimate lap between the hairpin and the final chicane landed him in hot water with the stewards.
Two hours after the race – shortly after meeting with Alonso and Bottas – the stewards decided Alonso had made too many changes of direction while defending and that those actions warranted a penalty.
“The stewards heard from the driver of car #14 [Fernando Alonso], the driver of car #77 [Valtteri Bottas] and team representatives and examined video evidence and telemetry from car #77,” the statement read.
“Between Turns 10 and 12, on the penultimate lap of the race, car #14 made repeated changes of direction to defend against car #77 who had to lift at one point and briefly lost momentum.
“Whilst noting the driver’s point that at no stage was any point of car #77 alongside car #14, the stewards consider this to be a clear breach of the regulation.
“The stewards therefore impose a five-second time penalty.”
The stewards said the penalty “was in line with” the five-second penalty Lance Stroll was issued in Melbourne earlier in the year when he was deemed to have made too many changes in direction.
Ironically the driver Stroll was defending against in that case was also Bottas.
Unlike Alonso, who drops from seventh to ninth in the classification, Stroll did not however lose any positions and was still classified in the 12th place he finished in.
Alonso’s penalty promotes the Alfa duo of Bottas and Zhou Guanyu into seventh and eighth places respectively.
It also means that Alpine and Alfa – who are in the fight with McLaren for fourth in the Formula 1 constructors’ championship – both scored 10 points in Montreal.
Canadian GP penalty for weaving costs Alonso two places - The Race (the-race.com)
CANADIAN GP PENALTY FOR WEAVING COSTS ALONSO TWO PLACES
Fernando Alonso has been handed a five-second penalty that drops him from seventh to ninth place in the Canadian Grand Prix after he was found to have changed direction too many times.
Front-row starter Alonso was defending seventh from Valtteri Bottas in the closing laps of the race, but his movements while attempting to keep the position on the penultimate lap between the hairpin and the final chicane landed him in hot water with the stewards.
Two hours after the race – shortly after meeting with Alonso and Bottas – the stewards decided Alonso had made too many changes of direction while defending and that those actions warranted a penalty.
“The stewards heard from the driver of car #14 [Fernando Alonso], the driver of car #77 [Valtteri Bottas] and team representatives and examined video evidence and telemetry from car #77,” the statement read.
“Between Turns 10 and 12, on the penultimate lap of the race, car #14 made repeated changes of direction to defend against car #77 who had to lift at one point and briefly lost momentum.
“Whilst noting the driver’s point that at no stage was any point of car #77 alongside car #14, the stewards consider this to be a clear breach of the regulation.
“The stewards therefore impose a five-second time penalty.”
The stewards said the penalty “was in line with” the five-second penalty Lance Stroll was issued in Melbourne earlier in the year when he was deemed to have made too many changes in direction.
Ironically the driver Stroll was defending against in that case was also Bottas.
Unlike Alonso, who drops from seventh to ninth in the classification, Stroll did not however lose any positions and was still classified in the 12th place he finished in.
Alonso’s penalty promotes the Alfa duo of Bottas and Zhou Guanyu into seventh and eighth places respectively.
It also means that Alpine and Alfa – who are in the fight with McLaren for fourth in the Formula 1 constructors’ championship – both scored 10 points in Montreal.
Canadian GP penalty for weaving costs Alonso two places - The Race (the-race.com)
THE ISSUE THAT LEFT ALONSO ‘DRIVING KAMIKAZE’ TO SAVE HIS GP
6 hours ago
By Josh Suttill
Fernando Alonso was left “driving kamikaze” while trying to salvage a Canadian Grand Prix points finish after his Alpine developed an engine issue that he says cost him a second on the straights every lap.
Alonso earned his first Formula 1 front row start in almost a decade with a stellar qualifying performance in damp conditions on Saturday.
While he held a podium position in the opening laps, he went backwards thereafter and ultimately finished the race behind his Alpine team-mate Esteban Ocon, who had started five places behind him on the grid.
Missing a chance to make a pitstop under the virtual safety car, and consequently running a 28-lap first stint that ended with worn tyres and poor pace, was costly for the double world champion.
But after the race, an evidently frustrated Alonso revealed he’d also been suffering from an engine problem from lap 20 of the 70-lap race, and felt this was the main reason his race had gone wrong. It is believed to have been caused by an air leak that limited the Alpine’s top-end power.
“The engine, that was the only answer,” said Alonso when asked what went wrong.
“[The engine] cut the energy very early on the straights, as soon as we exit the corners.
“We tried to fix it but it didn’t work. Luckily we didn’t retire the car and we still score a few points,
“Until that point, I think we were fighting for a podium at the beginning of the race. I felt strong compared to [Lewis] Hamilton, we just didn’t have the pace of [Max] Verstappen or [Carlos] Sainz. But we could maybe still be fighting for third, fourth.
“But when the engine problem came, it was just trying to survive.
“Trying to get DRS, I was driving kamikaze in the corners before the detection point, because the DRS was my only safety on the straights after that.”
The field was bunched up following a late-race safety car for Yuki Tsunoda’s stricken AlphaTauri, potentially leaving a hamstrung Alonso vulnerable.
His Alpine team asked sixth-placed Ocon to slow down to allow Alonso to claim DRS to defend from the Alfa Romeo of Valtteri Bottas behind him.
This allowed Alonso to do just that but not without him having to aggressively defend against Bottas – something he pushed too far on the final lap as he was deemed to have changed direction too many times and picked up a five-second penalty after the race.
The penalty dropped him from seventh in the classification to ninth.
But even before he heard the news of the penalty, Alonso was thoroughly unimpressed with his race.
“It’s another reliability issue on car #14 only. So that’s disappointing,” Alonso added.
“I’m here trying to be better than sixth or seventh and this weekend we were better than sixth and seventh.
“So if we didn’t finish in the podium or fourth, it’s because we had a reliability issue on car #14. Unlucky maybe a bit with safety car, but luck you can’t control, but reliability on car #14 should be better.”
Alonso’s reference to poor reliability on his side of the garage follows a tricky start to the season as he lost a potential top-six finish in Jeddah with a water pump failure and could have been on the second row in Melbourne without a hydraulic failure in qualifying that triggered a crash.
This was followed by a disastrous grand prix at Imola ended by a whack from Mick Schumacher and a home Spanish Grand Prix thwarted by a miscommunication in qualifying that led to a Q1 exit – although he did charge back to ninth place.
By contrast, Alonso’s team-mate Ocon is the only driver other than Mercedes duo Lewis Hamilton and George Russell to see the chequered flag in every race so far this season.
Alonso felt he had the pace to pass Ocon and was bemused to be quicker than Ocon despite believing he was losing a second per lap due to the engine clipping issue, saying on team radio “even with the straightline issue I’m a hundred times faster this weekend” after asking if he could “attack” his team-mate but being asked to “stay we are” because of the engine issue.
Ocon said his pace deficit was because of the aforementioned order to slow down and give Alonso the DRS assistance.
“He was losing a little bit of power, so I was backing off to him in purpose to try him to get the tow on me to be able to defend on Valtteri,” Ocon said after the race.
“So, we did a really good team work all together.”
Alpine team boss Otmar Szafnauer said “they couldn’t switch the order” because it risked Ocon getting swallowed by the cars behind when the switch happened.
Alonso’s two points move him back inside the top 10 in the drivers’ championship and Alpine’s haul of 10 puts it eight points off McLaren in their battle over fourth in the constructors’ championship – with Alfa Romeo a further six adrift.
The issue that left Alonso 'driving kamikaze' to save his GP - The Race (the-race.com)
THE ISSUE THAT LEFT ALONSO ‘DRIVING KAMIKAZE’ TO SAVE HIS GP
6 hours ago
By Josh Suttill
Fernando Alonso was left “driving kamikaze” while trying to salvage a Canadian Grand Prix points finish after his Alpine developed an engine issue that he says cost him a second on the straights every lap.
Alonso earned his first Formula 1 front row start in almost a decade with a stellar qualifying performance in damp conditions on Saturday.
While he held a podium position in the opening laps, he went backwards thereafter and ultimately finished the race behind his Alpine team-mate Esteban Ocon, who had started five places behind him on the grid.
Missing a chance to make a pitstop under the virtual safety car, and consequently running a 28-lap first stint that ended with worn tyres and poor pace, was costly for the double world champion.
But after the race, an evidently frustrated Alonso revealed he’d also been suffering from an engine problem from lap 20 of the 70-lap race, and felt this was the main reason his race had gone wrong. It is believed to have been caused by an air leak that limited the Alpine’s top-end power.
“The engine, that was the only answer,” said Alonso when asked what went wrong.
“[The engine] cut the energy very early on the straights, as soon as we exit the corners.
“We tried to fix it but it didn’t work. Luckily we didn’t retire the car and we still score a few points,
“Until that point, I think we were fighting for a podium at the beginning of the race. I felt strong compared to [Lewis] Hamilton, we just didn’t have the pace of [Max] Verstappen or [Carlos] Sainz. But we could maybe still be fighting for third, fourth.
“But when the engine problem came, it was just trying to survive.
“Trying to get DRS, I was driving kamikaze in the corners before the detection point, because the DRS was my only safety on the straights after that.”
The field was bunched up following a late-race safety car for Yuki Tsunoda’s stricken AlphaTauri, potentially leaving a hamstrung Alonso vulnerable.
His Alpine team asked sixth-placed Ocon to slow down to allow Alonso to claim DRS to defend from the Alfa Romeo of Valtteri Bottas behind him.
This allowed Alonso to do just that but not without him having to aggressively defend against Bottas – something he pushed too far on the final lap as he was deemed to have changed direction too many times and picked up a five-second penalty after the race.
The penalty dropped him from seventh in the classification to ninth.
But even before he heard the news of the penalty, Alonso was thoroughly unimpressed with his race.
“It’s another reliability issue on car #14 only. So that’s disappointing,” Alonso added.
“I’m here trying to be better than sixth or seventh and this weekend we were better than sixth and seventh.
“So if we didn’t finish in the podium or fourth, it’s because we had a reliability issue on car #14. Unlucky maybe a bit with safety car, but luck you can’t control, but reliability on car #14 should be better.”
Alonso’s reference to poor reliability on his side of the garage follows a tricky start to the season as he lost a potential top-six finish in Jeddah with a water pump failure and could have been on the second row in Melbourne without a hydraulic failure in qualifying that triggered a crash.
This was followed by a disastrous grand prix at Imola ended by a whack from Mick Schumacher and a home Spanish Grand Prix thwarted by a miscommunication in qualifying that led to a Q1 exit – although he did charge back to ninth place.
By contrast, Alonso’s team-mate Ocon is the only driver other than Mercedes duo Lewis Hamilton and George Russell to see the chequered flag in every race so far this season.
Alonso felt he had the pace to pass Ocon and was bemused to be quicker than Ocon despite believing he was losing a second per lap due to the engine clipping issue, saying on team radio “even with the straightline issue I’m a hundred times faster this weekend” after asking if he could “attack” his team-mate but being asked to “stay we are” because of the engine issue.
Ocon said his pace deficit was because of the aforementioned order to slow down and give Alonso the DRS assistance.
“He was losing a little bit of power, so I was backing off to him in purpose to try him to get the tow on me to be able to defend on Valtteri,” Ocon said after the race.
“So, we did a really good team work all together.”
Alpine team boss Otmar Szafnauer said “they couldn’t switch the order” because it risked Ocon getting swallowed by the cars behind when the switch happened.
Alonso’s two points move him back inside the top 10 in the drivers’ championship and Alpine’s haul of 10 puts it eight points off McLaren in their battle over fourth in the constructors’ championship – with Alfa Romeo a further six adrift.
The issue that left Alonso 'driving kamikaze' to save his GP - The Race (the-race.com)
我听到李兵提到雪鸟这傻叉又想到这了
拥抱阿蒙
我听到李兵提到雪鸟这傻叉又想到这了
拥抱阿蒙
打分护体我头本头
需要积分啊头哥！
打分护体我头本头
需要积分啊头哥！
TREMAYNE: Why age continues to be nothing but a number for the masterful, mischievous Fernando Alonso
Hall of Fame F1 Journalist David Tremayne
23 June 2022
Could there have been a better front row for the Canadian GP than Max Verstappen and Fernando Alonso? The reigning world champion, who holds most of the youngest-ever records, versus the oldest man on the grid, who once held so many of them himself?
“It’s been a while since Fernando and I have been alongside each other on the grid,” Max said – and they never had actually been side-by-side before, I’m reliably informed. “I used to look up to him as a young kid, watching Formula 1, with him being up there winning races and championships, so it’s great to be sharing the front row with him.”
Fernando gave that dark smile of his, clearly elated to be going so well, though not surprised by his own speed. “I think we'll attack Max on the first corner,” he smirked.
I liked all that. Great box office.
The rain had rendered this the most open qualifying session of the season, and by far the most exciting. Edge of the seat stuff. All through the three sessions, the lap times tumbled with the speed of machine gun fire, as the track improved literally lap by lap and one star replaced another over and over.
But there was a definite pattern. Max, in the Red Bull RB18, had the best car, that was more than obvious. And, boy, does he know how to use it. It was slippery, and every time you encountered another car you risked losing crucial tyre temperature. It was a credit to the standards of F1 driving that so few made errors on a day when that would have been easy. More great box office.
Q1 saw Max top the timesheets with 1m 32.219s on Pirelli’s full wets, but there was Fernando, in Alpine’s ever-improving A522, right with him on 1m 32.277s, ahead of the Ferraris of Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc as they sandwiched Kevin Magnussen’s Haas.
Conditions improved sufficiently for intermediates in Q2, and though this time it was a similar story, with Max fastest and Ferdy chasing him, the gap had expanded dramatically: 1m 23.746s versus 1m 24.848s, and this time behind them it was the Mercedes of George Russell and Lewis Hamilton sandwiching Carlos.
So it all came down to Q3, when conditions continued to improve but, as the bold George Russell discovered, the standing water in Turns 1 and 2 just militated against the switch to soft slicks.
Again, Max was the man, quickly supplanting the Mercedes duo with a stupendous lap of 1m 22.701s, but that wasn’t the end of it. Right in the closing stages he improved to 1m 21.620s, owning the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, and as George slithered and slid, it was Lewis who burst into second place with 1m 22.891s. That too was good to see. The two foes of 2021 side by side on the front row? Not quite…
Max wasn’t finished yet, as he improved yet further to 1m 21.299s to throw pole beyond the reach of anyone else, but right at the end there was Fernando, and how he must have loved not just pushing Lewis down a place, but also Carlos, whose 1m 22.096s had removed the seven-time champion from the front row. For the first time since Germany in 2012, back in his Ferrari days, Fernando claimed a front-row slot, with a lovely lap of 1m 21.944s.
In the end, Fernando never did attack Max, and an engine problem hampered his race from the 20th lap onwards. And at one point when asked to stay behind Esteban as they battled for sixth place, he reverted to Old Fernando as he declaimed how he had been “100 times faster all weekend,” but that was the frustration leaking through as the warrior in him bemoaned yet more of the reliability injustice that has dogged his season. That was stoked further when the stewards later gave him a five-second penalty for weaving on the straight, which dropped him from the seventh he was already unhappy with to ninth.
So, in the end, there was no fairy story this time. But don’t tell me that Fernando’s performance this weekend didn’t add hugely to the drama and appeal of the Canadian GP.
TBC
TREMAYNE: Why age continues to be nothing but a number for the masterful, mischievous Fernando Alonso
Hall of Fame F1 Journalist David Tremayne
23 June 2022
Could there have been a better front row for the Canadian GP than Max Verstappen and Fernando Alonso? The reigning world champion, who holds most of the youngest-ever records, versus the oldest man on the grid, who once held so many of them himself?
“It’s been a while since Fernando and I have been alongside each other on the grid,” Max said – and they never had actually been side-by-side before, I’m reliably informed. “I used to look up to him as a young kid, watching Formula 1, with him being up there winning races and championships, so it’s great to be sharing the front row with him.”
Fernando gave that dark smile of his, clearly elated to be going so well, though not surprised by his own speed. “I think we'll attack Max on the first corner,” he smirked.
I liked all that. Great box office.
The rain had rendered this the most open qualifying session of the season, and by far the most exciting. Edge of the seat stuff. All through the three sessions, the lap times tumbled with the speed of machine gun fire, as the track improved literally lap by lap and one star replaced another over and over.
But there was a definite pattern. Max, in the Red Bull RB18, had the best car, that was more than obvious. And, boy, does he know how to use it. It was slippery, and every time you encountered another car you risked losing crucial tyre temperature. It was a credit to the standards of F1 driving that so few made errors on a day when that would have been easy. More great box office.
Q1 saw Max top the timesheets with 1m 32.219s on Pirelli’s full wets, but there was Fernando, in Alpine’s ever-improving A522, right with him on 1m 32.277s, ahead of the Ferraris of Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc as they sandwiched Kevin Magnussen’s Haas.
Conditions improved sufficiently for intermediates in Q2, and though this time it was a similar story, with Max fastest and Ferdy chasing him, the gap had expanded dramatically: 1m 23.746s versus 1m 24.848s, and this time behind them it was the Mercedes of George Russell and Lewis Hamilton sandwiching Carlos.
So it all came down to Q3, when conditions continued to improve but, as the bold George Russell discovered, the standing water in Turns 1 and 2 just militated against the switch to soft slicks.
Again, Max was the man, quickly supplanting the Mercedes duo with a stupendous lap of 1m 22.701s, but that wasn’t the end of it. Right in the closing stages he improved to 1m 21.620s, owning the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, and as George slithered and slid, it was Lewis who burst into second place with 1m 22.891s. That too was good to see. The two foes of 2021 side by side on the front row? Not quite…
Max wasn’t finished yet, as he improved yet further to 1m 21.299s to throw pole beyond the reach of anyone else, but right at the end there was Fernando, and how he must have loved not just pushing Lewis down a place, but also Carlos, whose 1m 22.096s had removed the seven-time champion from the front row. For the first time since Germany in 2012, back in his Ferrari days, Fernando claimed a front-row slot, with a lovely lap of 1m 21.944s.
In the end, Fernando never did attack Max, and an engine problem hampered his race from the 20th lap onwards. And at one point when asked to stay behind Esteban as they battled for sixth place, he reverted to Old Fernando as he declaimed how he had been “100 times faster all weekend,” but that was the frustration leaking through as the warrior in him bemoaned yet more of the reliability injustice that has dogged his season. That was stoked further when the stewards later gave him a five-second penalty for weaving on the straight, which dropped him from the seventh he was already unhappy with to ninth.
So, in the end, there was no fairy story this time. But don’t tell me that Fernando’s performance this weekend didn’t add hugely to the drama and appeal of the Canadian GP.
TBC
We live in an age which tends to champion youth, often at the expense of age and experience. There have been many who have been surprised by Fernando’s fire and speed as he approaches 41. Recently, somebody pointed out that he has been racing in F1 longer than latest promising wannabe Oscar Piastri has been on the planet (he made his debut Down Under on April 4, two days before Oscar, who is also on Alpine’s books, was born in Melbourne). But though age has a habit of changing everyone, in the case of racing drivers, it’s more often the case that the passion and commitment fade before the physical side. But definitely not for Fernando, for whom age is just a number.
I remember Rupert Manwaring, Minardi’s former Commercial Director, raving about his talent back in 2001 when he made that debut with Minardi in Albert Park. Back then, eyes were on his fellow debutants: Juan Pablo Montoya at Williams was the hero of IndyCar, while upstart Kimi Raikkonen had shown prodigious speed in testing for Sauber but was on super licence probation having made the jump straight from Formula Renault. In the end, Fernando would upstage them both.
How we loved him back in 2005 and '06! Having broken through in Hungary in 2003 to give Renault’s unusual 111-degree V10 engine its sole victory, he really won his spurs as he held off Michael Schumacher to win the 2005 San Marino GP. And that year and 2006, his driving eclipsed the German’s and ended his reign with Ferrari.
Ironically, things went wrong when Fernando moved to McLaren for 2007. When he learned that Ron Dennis intended to put GP2 champion Lewis Hamilton into the second MP4-22 rather than his countryman Pedro de la Rosa, he reportedly responded: “So you don’t want to win the constructors’ title, then?” But Lewis upstaged him, and though they each ended the season with four wins and 109 points, they lost out in the final race in Brazil to Kimi Raikkonen, and Lewis beat Fernando to runner-up slot on countback with five second places to four.
Rookie Hamilton was a thorn in Alonso's side back in 2007
Fernando left in dudgeon at the end of a controversial and acrimonious year, and returned to Renault before joining Ferrari for 2010. More championships surely beckoned. It's said that he wept for an hour in the Ferrari hospitality back in Abu Dhabi at the end of that year, when Sebastian Vettel leapfrogged both him and his own Red Bull team mate Mark Webber to snatch his first world title at the 11th hour.
Later, empty-handed as far as fresh titles were concerned, the surprise return to McLaren in their troubled re-alliance with Honda prefaced the worst period of his career. But despite things such as that pithy “GP2 engine” comment which so stung Honda at Suzuka, he never gave up. And as his team mate Jenson Button will tell you, you had to work damn hard even then to get anywhere near him.
That all led to the adventure at Indianapolis in 2017 where he so nearly won the famed 500 and proved his ability to a whole new audience. Success at Le Mans and winning the 2018-2019 World Drivers’ Championship with Toyota brought him back to the F1 orbit a changed man.
Once perceived as an awkward team player who was only ever interested in his own welfare, he came back sunnier, perhaps now at peace with the fact that he has never won as many titles as his prodigious talent merited. And clearly fast enough still to lead a team. The new poster boy for over-40s.
His friendship with Esteban is one of the most impressive things about Renault’s transition into Alpine. It’s a genuine master and pupil relationship, reminiscent of that which Jackie Stewart and Francois Cevert enjoyed at Tyrrell. Fernando drove for Esteban in Hungary last year, crucially holding back Lewis’s attack (and reminding everyone what he could still do), then encouraged his team mate to “drive like a lion!” in Qatar to help him score his own first podium since China 2014…
People say that F1 is always better for having a competitive Ferrari, and the same applies when old warriors such as Fernando add dimension by continuing to fight with everything they have to thrill fans across the globe. And it’s better still when they are passionate, outspoken… and still very, very fast.
We live in an age which tends to champion youth, often at the expense of age and experience. There have been many who have been surprised by Fernando’s fire and speed as he approaches 41. Recently, somebody pointed out that he has been racing in F1 longer than latest promising wannabe Oscar Piastri has been on the planet (he made his debut Down Under on April 4, two days before Oscar, who is also on Alpine’s books, was born in Melbourne). But though age has a habit of changing everyone, in the case of racing drivers, it’s more often the case that the passion and commitment fade before the physical side. But definitely not for Fernando, for whom age is just a number.
I remember Rupert Manwaring, Minardi’s former Commercial Director, raving about his talent back in 2001 when he made that debut with Minardi in Albert Park. Back then, eyes were on his fellow debutants: Juan Pablo Montoya at Williams was the hero of IndyCar, while upstart Kimi Raikkonen had shown prodigious speed in testing for Sauber but was on super licence probation having made the jump straight from Formula Renault. In the end, Fernando would upstage them both.
How we loved him back in 2005 and '06! Having broken through in Hungary in 2003 to give Renault’s unusual 111-degree V10 engine its sole victory, he really won his spurs as he held off Michael Schumacher to win the 2005 San Marino GP. And that year and 2006, his driving eclipsed the German’s and ended his reign with Ferrari.
Ironically, things went wrong when Fernando moved to McLaren for 2007. When he learned that Ron Dennis intended to put GP2 champion Lewis Hamilton into the second MP4-22 rather than his countryman Pedro de la Rosa, he reportedly responded: “So you don’t want to win the constructors’ title, then?” But Lewis upstaged him, and though they each ended the season with four wins and 109 points, they lost out in the final race in Brazil to Kimi Raikkonen, and Lewis beat Fernando to runner-up slot on countback with five second places to four.
Rookie Hamilton was a thorn in Alonso's side back in 2007
Fernando left in dudgeon at the end of a controversial and acrimonious year, and returned to Renault before joining Ferrari for 2010. More championships surely beckoned. It's said that he wept for an hour in the Ferrari hospitality back in Abu Dhabi at the end of that year, when Sebastian Vettel leapfrogged both him and his own Red Bull team mate Mark Webber to snatch his first world title at the 11th hour.
Later, empty-handed as far as fresh titles were concerned, the surprise return to McLaren in their troubled re-alliance with Honda prefaced the worst period of his career. But despite things such as that pithy “GP2 engine” comment which so stung Honda at Suzuka, he never gave up. And as his team mate Jenson Button will tell you, you had to work damn hard even then to get anywhere near him.
That all led to the adventure at Indianapolis in 2017 where he so nearly won the famed 500 and proved his ability to a whole new audience. Success at Le Mans and winning the 2018-2019 World Drivers’ Championship with Toyota brought him back to the F1 orbit a changed man.
Once perceived as an awkward team player who was only ever interested in his own welfare, he came back sunnier, perhaps now at peace with the fact that he has never won as many titles as his prodigious talent merited. And clearly fast enough still to lead a team. The new poster boy for over-40s.
His friendship with Esteban is one of the most impressive things about Renault’s transition into Alpine. It’s a genuine master and pupil relationship, reminiscent of that which Jackie Stewart and Francois Cevert enjoyed at Tyrrell. Fernando drove for Esteban in Hungary last year, crucially holding back Lewis’s attack (and reminding everyone what he could still do), then encouraged his team mate to “drive like a lion!” in Qatar to help him score his own first podium since China 2014…
People say that F1 is always better for having a competitive Ferrari, and the same applies when old warriors such as Fernando add dimension by continuing to fight with everything they have to thrill fans across the globe. And it’s better still when they are passionate, outspoken… and still very, very fast.
