Alonso's Imola weekend
Fernando Alonso, driver for the Renault F1 Team, got into the points yet again last Sunday. Here he tells us all about his weekend. There was a nasty surprise for the team on Friday: "Friday was a rather difficult day," reveals Fernando. "In fact, ...
Fernando Alonso, driver for the Renault F1 Team, got into the points yet again last Sunday. Here he tells us all about his weekend.
There was a nasty surprise for the team on Friday:
"Friday was a rather difficult day," reveals Fernando. "In fact, the
car wasn't handling how we thought it would. Our lap-times were not
competitive. We did not have sufficient straight-line speed, and we
were lacking grip out of the chicanes. The tyres were okay, but the
Bridgestone teams seemed to be performing well too. BAR and Jordan's lap
times were a source of concern for us."
"We worked hard on Friday evening, concentrating on the mechanical and aerodynamic set-up," says the Spaniard. "This bore fruit straight away: on Saturday, the handling of my car was completely changed. I refound the level of competitiveness we had enjoyed in the first few races, and I managed to improve my lap-times and fine-tune the settings for qualifying and the race. In the end, eighth place on the grid was a good performance. My flying lap was competitive and we could not have done much better."
Sunday - sixth place:
"The race did not hold any nasty surprises for me," says Fernando. "I
had to give 100% from start to finish because I was competing with the
best. Raikkonen first, then Coulthard and Montoya -- I had no time to
catch my breath! I had a good time at Imola; there is no doubt about
that. I love competing. Also, the team reacted really well by changing
my strategy. I started on a three-stopper, but we were afraid we would
find ourselves caught up in traffic, so we changed our plans. I ended
up stopping twice, which was the right thing to do in the situation we
found ourselves in!"
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