Fernando Alonso planning for tight battle behind Red Bull in Saudi grand prix
Fernando Alonso says the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix will be a tightly-contested battle for those behind the dominant Red Bull of Segio Perez.
Fernando Alonso will fight to lead the rest of the field in Jeddah. (Aston Martin)
The Aston Martin driver will start on the front row beside the Mexican Red Bull driver, but says Red Bull is well beyond any of the other teams on the grid.
“I don't want to sound pessimistic but if we see the pace the whole weekend in free practice, we see the Bahrain race, we have to be honest with ourselves and know that Red Bull is a little bit ahead of everyone,” said the Spaniard.
“So that's not, let's say, the target tomorrow, you know, to fight for the win with Checo.”
Despite Max Verstappen starting down in P15 due to a driveshaft failure, Alonso says that he believes the championship-leading Red Bull driver will sail through the field.
“I think tomorrow, there is no doubt that he will be in the podium, probably, minimum.”
Despite his acceptance that Red Bull could run away with the race victory, Alonso says the rest of the field will be hard to seperate.
“[A] very tight race, I expect,” said Alonso.
“And that will be defined by small details. One will be the start, one will be the tyre management. The other one will be the strategy.”
“And probably the final one will be the luck, because we saw even last year with Checo, you know, how luck and the safety car can play a big factor here.”
“So, you know, we have to nail all of these points.”
“I think as a team, we are ready to take care of everything that is in our hands.”
“The car seems to perform well on the long runs.”
“Seems very easy on tyres, as we saw also last year with the old Aston Martin, but also in Bahrain, it seems good.”
“So yeah, let's try to maximise our strengths. And hopefully be lucky as well.”
Alonso celebrates after qualifying on Saturday. (Aston Martin)
Alonso says despite his pace in Bahrain, he left with question marks over whether it would be a one-off performance from the team.
Reassured by the results so far in Jeddah and his front-row starting position for the Grand Prix, Alonso is now able to firmly commit to the goals set pre-season by the team for the battle behind Red Bull.
The battle for Aston, according to Alonso, will be any improvements made by Mercedes or Alpine.
“When we launched the car on the 13th of February, I remember very well a conversation with Mike Krack, with Lance, with the senior management of the team, setting the goals for this year, and the goals were not fighting Red Bull for the win tomorrow.”
“So let's keep it simple.”
“Let's keep the feet on the ground, and don't make any mistakes, you know.”
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