Alonso makes no secret of his enthusiasm and assures the car has room for improvement

Since testing, I had the handbrake on. When asked if he could take his 33rd win of the year or aim for the podium at the first race in Bahrain, he said he would have to “keep his feet on the ground”. The specialist put him in a battle with Mercedes and Ferrari, and Toto Wolff even said Aston Martin could be the second car after Red Bull. liked And despite the fact that he is still cautious, the Spaniard has started to conjure illusions with his words after what happened this Friday on the opening day of the Bahrain F1 GP. Alonso led Free Practice 2 with the best time of the day, showing just a bit more race pace than Verstappen’s Red Bull.

“Obviously the car feels good to drive. I’d be lying if I said it didn’t feel right,” said the man from Oviedo after getting out of his Aston Martin AMR23. “But it’s all related to what other teams are doing. Sometimes you feel better when you’re in the car, but when there are three or four cars faster than you, you don’t feel that much better. So let’s see where we are,” added the Spaniard, who is still cautious about the actual position of his car, running a lap longer than Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari.

“Of course it’s good to see the competitive times. I always have mixed feelings about where I am after testing, qualifying and the race[this weekend in Bahrain]and probably a very different circuit. Bahrain, Jeddah and Australia until we get into the first three races in ,” he added. We made it clear that there is room for improvement.

“At the moment we are focused on ourselves. The car still has a lot to improve. The balance wasn’t perfect today. The team needs to change a few things. We are in the process of strengthening each area of ​​the team,” insisted the Spaniard.

“I have a different philosophy than in the past. Stoffel[Vandoorne, reserve driver]also has different experience. That’s the process we’re working on right now and it’s very interesting,” added Fernando, adding team owner Lawrence Stroll, who is putting all the pieces together to make Aston Martin a winning team. wanted to underscore the ambition of

“I think Lawrence has this vision in everything he does. It’s very hard to see Lawrence Stroll fail at what’s in his vision. I think it’s only a matter of time before we’re ready to challenge ourselves, we’re going through a very interesting process with a completely new car, a new technical department and a lot of learning, but we still have a long way to go. I think it’s a long time,” he concluded.