Alpine’s Fernando Alonso is confident that Alpine are ‘definitely heading in the right direction’ after a difficult 2021 Spanish Grand Prix.
Having qualified tenth, Alonso endured a difficult home race as he was forced onto a late two-stop strategy as he finished 17th fastest.
Explaining where his race went wrong after losing tenth to Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll in the opening stint, Alonso said; “We had some fun battles today and I enjoyed the racing, but we just couldn’t hang on in the end with the Medium tyres.”
Alonso however believes that this weekend saw “positive” progress with the Alpine A521 with “good performance” which has left the 39 year-old confident that “… we are definitely heading in the right direction.”
Teammate, Esteban Ocon meanwhile felt that he had endured “a tough race” and that there is plenty of data analysis to conduct, commenting; “We have a few things to review as we weren’t as fast as the Ferraris or the McLarens in the race.”
Ocon did however take heart in the fact that he finished ninth and brought two points home for the team despite starting fifth, having failed to register points at last year’s race alongside then teammate – Daniel Ricciardo.
Reflecting on his race pace and how Alpine can improve in Monaco, Ocon said; “We have more work to do on race pace and, as always, some things to discuss to improve ourselves.”
Alpine Executive Director, Marcin Budkowski meanwhile admitted that the results weren’t what the team expecting following what he described as “a very positive qualifying” with both cars in Q3.
Budkowski also admitted that Alpine simply lacked the pace to fight for more points but feels that their poor performance give them something to focus on for Monaco in a fortnight’s time.
Explaining what the team will be doing over the next week to prepare for F1’s first trip to Monaco since 2019, Budkowski said; “We didn’t have the pace to fight with Ferrari or McLaren in the race today, so that gives us an area to focus on and find further improvements.”
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