Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin; Albert Park, 2023

Alonso has another six years in him, says Fittipaldi

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In the round-up: Two-times Formula 1 world champion Emerson Fittipaldi believes Fernando Alonso has many years left in the world championship

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In brief

Alonso has another six years in him, says Fittipaldi

Fernando Alonso can continue to race competitively for at least another six years, his fellow two-times world champion Emerson Fittipaldi believes.

The Aston Martin driver, who has finished third in every race so far this year, will turn 42 in July. Fittipaldi, who raced well into his forties in America’s CART IndyCar series after retiring from F1, believes Alonso can replicate what he did.

“I won my last race in the United States at the age of 47 and Alonso can reach that age at a high level,” Fittipaldi told AS. “He is physically very well and is hungry for victory.”

Despite Red Bull’s dominant start to the season, Fittipaldi said Alonso will be “one of the favorites” to win in Monaco next month, due to the unusually tight nature of the circuit. “The [Red Bull drivers] will also go very strong in Monaco but it is obvious that Fernando will have his options,” said Fittipaldi. “He can win if he is lucky.”

Cassidy’s Buemi rant just “driver frustration” says Filippi

Envision Formula E team principal Sylvain Filippi has dismissed complaints by driver Nick Cassidy about team mate Sebastian Buemi as just “a bit of driver frustration”.

Cassidy complained about his team mate over the radio in Sunday’s practice session after he felt Buemi compromised his final timed lap. “That was really kind of Seb,” Cassidy said sarcastically. “What a great team mate.”

Asked during qualifying about Cassidy’s radio message, Filippi said it reflected the pressures on his drivers as they are in position to fight for poles and race wins.

“I think [it’s] a bit of driver frustration,” he said. “I think, in a way, when you have the car to win races and win championships, obviously the stakes are higher and there’s a bit of frustration sometimes.

“We’ve been there before. It’s our job to calm things down and then make sure they’re focussed on the job. But I would much rather that in a quick car than the other way around . So we’ll manage it.”

Cassidy won yesterday’s second Eprix in Berlin after Buemi suffered damage and fell near the back of the field.

FREC racer Fitzgerald suffers fractured vertebrae due to sausage kerb

Formula Regional European Championship racer Adam Fitzgerald suffered three fractured vertebrae after hitting a sausage kerb in the opening race of the weekend in Imola on Saturday.

The R-P-M driver finished the race in 22nd place despite bouncing over the sausage kerb, which team principal Keith Donegan claimed launched his driver “maybe 1.3-1.4 metres in the air”.

“Adam has three fractured vertebrae in his back,” Donegan told Formula Scout. “He hit the first sausage and went maybe half a metre, and then even more I’d say, maybe 1.3, 1.4 metres in the air because he hit the first sausage and then the second one launched him.”

It is the latest in a series of injuries in single-seater racing connected to the controversial kerbs. W Series racer Abbie Eaton suffered similar injuries after being launched over a kerb at Circuit of the Americas in 2021 and F2 driver Sean Galael also injured on a kerb during a race at Circuit de Catalunya.

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Comment of the day

This weekend’s Caption Competition winner is @ninjabadger!:

After repeated fan backlash for rain affected sessions being red flagged, the FIA commited to allowing more wet races, no matter the conditions.

NinjaBadger

Thanks to everyone who came up with caption idea this week and a special mention to Coventry Climax, Short Circuit, Jeanrien and Tommy C, who all came up with particularly good captions.

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday to Mags, Tim and Pete Walker!

On this day in motorsport

  • 40 years ago today ex-F1 racer and multiple Daytona 24 Hours winner Rolf Stommelen died in a crash at Riverside

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Will Wood
Will has been a RaceFans contributor since 2012 during which time he has covered F1 test sessions, launch events and interviewed drivers. He mainly...

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18 comments on “Alonso has another six years in him, says Fittipaldi”

  1. Sausage kerbs need to go! Enough is enough!

    FIA is fast becoming known for their frequently inadequate actions.

    1. Coventry Climax
      24th April 2023, 2:50

      Yep, and as it’ll never get right in the head of the person that came up with the idea in the first place anyway, sack him/her please.

    2. Jonathan Parkin
      24th April 2023, 5:49

      Grass and gravel

    3. @skipgamer what I don’t get is – what is the argument FOR sausage kerbs? I’ve literally never heard anyone say they’re a good idea, nobody. Someone somewhere must think they’re great.

      It’s not just Peroni being flipped 30ft in the air and landing where nobody would ever expect a race car to end up. Abbie’s was a somewhat pedestrian incident, she basically just went over it and broke her back.

      I guess they’re a ‘deterrent’, but as pointed out above, so is grass and gravel, and they don’t break cars or bones at low speed, or launch cars to the moon at high speed.

      1. I guess their main purpose is a deterrent that’s difficult to cross in either direction, whether going off track or trying to re-join the track and forcing you to take a particular route. I’m pretty confident a better kerb can be developed that forces a drive to take a particular route back to the track without risking them being launched can be developed.

    4. @skipgamer @bernasaurus @Coventry Climax @Jonathan Parkin
      Imola doesn’t even have sausage curbs, which I double-checked from last season’s pole lap onboard, even though I remembered correctly.
      Besides, such curbs & similar ones or small bumps have existed for a long time, yet people only started complaining in the recent past, which is somewhat contradictory.

      1. Besides, such curbs & similar ones or small bumps have existed for a long time, yet people only started complaining in the recent past, which is somewhat contradictory.

        The lower the driving standards get, the more complaints there are about things that aren’t even on the race track.
        Nobody was driving off (or pushing others off) in 1953, why are they doing it now, 70 years later…?

        The safer the circuits become – the less respect the drivers give them, and their own competitors.
        And then there are the cars, which despite being vastly safer than in the past, are also vastly more dangerous (as shown by these otherwise innocuous kerbs).

        The bottom line is if track limits and sporting regulations were properly enforced, they’d be properly respected and nobody would ever be anywhere near anything that can launch the car.

    5. I guess the options are (to quote a dog in a TV ad):
      Sausages, walls –
      or fix the track layout. If your chicane can be shortcut there’s something wrong with the design of it.

  2. Brad Pitt want to lead the pack i wonder if Max are going to overtake him …. als he doesn’t like someone in front of him :)

  3. Ricciardo’s top team options are limited for the time being, so in all likelihood, he won’t make a full-time return for next season, not that lower teams necessarily have any vacance for him either.

    Imola doesn’t even have sausage curbs.

    Good song about Ocon & yet another driver-specific song that already existed for three drivers.

  4. All the quotes I’ve read about Ricciardo over the last few months would have you believe he chose to leave McLaren and take a year off!

    1. I mean he did choose to leave Mclaren and take a year off because had he dugs his heels in and demanded they uphold his contract he could have stayed. Obviously the partnership wasn’t working for either party though and Ricciardo accepted a good severance to go quietly and give him a chance to save some face and start to rebuild his career early.

      I seriously doubt Mclaren could have got away with sacking Ricciardo so the settlement option was the only way they could get Piastri in imo.

      1. had he dugs his heels in and demanded they uphold his contract he could have stayed

        McLaren would have benched him in favour of Oscar and that behaviour would have ended his chances at any F1 team ever again. So while he could have stayed at McLaren it would be in the same capacity as he is with Red Bull now.

        1. But collecting his full salary! I think the move was the right one for all concerned by the way just highlighting that he did actually choose to leave in the end, he wasn’t sacked hence why the reports are worded as such.

    2. Well in a way he did. At the very least he was mentally checked out. There’s only so many times you can be told “you are wrong, we are right, do it out way” by an employer before wanting to leave them. Especially when you are an expert and proven performer in your field (remember, he was able to turn Renault around in his 2 years there through setup experimentation.)

      He would have stuck out the third year of course but unless there was a huge change in philosophy of actually listening to him rather than ordering him, the result would have been the same.

      Anyway, the quotes weren’t about choosing not to have a seat with McLaren, but rather choosing not to take a seat in F1 (ie HAAS) just to make up the numbers. In that sense, he definitely chose to take a year off from racing.

  5. Alonso winning the Monaco GP would trully be epic! On top of that, Scott Dixon would win the Indy500 at 42yo as well.

  6. I’m trying to work out what’s going to happen at Silverstone. Brad Pitt driving some done up F1 looking car in front of all the actual drivers??!

    1. @davidhunter13 I was thinking can I go too if I bring my camera and my friend with me so we can do a documentary

Comments are closed.