Fernando Alonso described the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix as the “most boring race ever” after finishing in the lowest position he ever has in his career.
The Aston Martin driver finished 19th. He has only placed that low in a race once before, in Mexico two years ago, though on that occasion he was classified despite his car stopping in the closing stages.He qualified 19th but Aston Martin decided to make changes to his car’s set-up which meant he had to start from the pits. That left Alonso hoping for some kind of disruption in the race which would bring him into contention, but none came.
“It’s that kind of weekend where it’s a little bit frustrating that on the race you know more or less what is going to happen,” he told the official F1 channel.
“You obviously hope for some Safety Cars or red flags or something that can mix a little bit the race. But, today as usual when we start at the back at zero, the most boring race ever.”
Aston Martin introduced a significant upgrade to its AMR24 this weekend. After Alonso failed to progress beyond Q1 they took the opportunity to vary the set-ups between his car and that of team mate Lance Stroll.
Alonso expects that will give them useful information for the coming races. “We need to wait and see all the data that we’ve gathered today and ask the team what they saw difference between the two cars,” he said.
“We opted for two set-ups, different on my car, and let’s see if we find our direction for the next few races.
“It was a tough weekend. Obviously, qualifying dictates everything here. It will be the same in Monaco. So we need to do that perfect Saturday that obviously makes things easier for Sunday.”
Aston Martin team principal Mike Krack said Alonso “played the team game perfectly” by making an early pit stop to provoke others to come in and help Stroll secure ninth place.
“Lance made his one-stop race work with a long first stint, while Fernando’s early pit stop on lap eight helped draw several cars in for early stops,” said Krack. “Lance was then able to make strong overtakes into turn one on [Nico] Hulkenberg and [Yuki] Tsunoda to secure P9.
“It was not easy to overtake, so it was great to watch Lance making those moves. It was always going to be difficult for Fernando to progress to the points after the difficult qualifying, but he played the team game perfectly.”
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Tristan
19th May 2024, 19:40
Would he rather have been sitting in a deck chair?
Jere (@jerejj)
19th May 2024, 20:39
Maybe the most boring ever from his position, but definitely not the most boring ever to watch.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
20th May 2024, 2:24
I’m sure it was the most boring for some of us.
Nick T.
20th May 2024, 2:50
The last couple laps were pretty entertaining.
PT
19th May 2024, 21:32
Helping Lance still does not explain why Alonso was stuck behind Sargeant and even drifting away from him after his early first stop for the hards. I was expecting the Aston Martin-Mercedes to make significant ground from the rear, but he couldn’t even keep up with Sargeant! And why did he stop at the penultimate lap for a fresh set of softs? As we saw in China, when they threw away a high points score for Alonso, Aston Martin race strategies this year have been strangely dubious. The team is also like the Iron Curtain, being extremely secretive and vague. Alonso said he faced problems in the car during his Q1 fast run, but what exactly were those problems. And where they partly the reason why his car totally lacked pace in the race? What’s going on?
Jay
20th May 2024, 2:37
They pit at the end to try to prevent Mercedes from getting the fast lap point, but it didn’t work.
pcxmac (@pcxmac)
19th May 2024, 21:42
Aston look like garbage, pretty soon Alpine will be beating them handily and they will be stuck in the back with Williams. Thats one way for Merc to stay ahead in the championship.
Leroy (@g-funk)
19th May 2024, 23:48
Hope he’s enjoying that paycheck to play wet nurse
Mayrton
21st May 2024, 6:51
It was one of the worst races in over a decade. Borefest