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Fernando Alonso has lesser points than Sebastian Vettel this season. This becomes significant when taking into account the fact that the latter has raced in 2 fewer races and is driving an Aston Martin that is probably the second slowest car on the grid. This predicament faced by Alonso, however, is not a result of his drop in performance in any which way. This is rather the reflection of the situation Alpine finds itself in at the moment.
Fernando Alonso finished in points at the season-opener in Bahrain. Subsequently, he had a DNF in Saudi Arabia, a hydraulic failure in qualifying that destroyed his race in Australia, and then another DNF in Imola. If one looks at the difficult situation the Spaniard finds himself in, the roots of this go much deeper than just what we have covered so far. In this piece, we take a look at why Alonso might just be having second thoughts about continuing and how he might get pushed towards retirement from the sport.
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Alpine has not progressed to the front of the midfield
After the first four races of the season, Alpine is pretty much where it was last season. It is fighting hard to make it to Q3 during qualifying and then scoring a handful of points at the lower end of the top-10. The season started well for the team but what does seem obvious at the moment is that it has already lost ground to McLaren in the battle of midfield. Meanwhile, teams like Alfa Romeo, Haas, and sometimes even AlphaTauri, have a better piece of machinery for their drivers.
To make things worse, Alpine has poor reliability to contend with as it ruined Esteban Ocon's weekend in Imola and has also hampered the entire season of Fernando Alonso. The Spaniard joined the team intending to maybe fight for the title soon. What is obvious from the evidence now, however, is that the team is not making the kind of progress it needs to if it wants to progress beyond midfield.
The Imola GP somewhat exposed the gulf between Alpine and the best of midfield
Anyone that saw what was going on in Alpine would have recognized the massive gulf between the team and the top contenders of midfield. McLaren's Daniel Ricciardo was at the tail of the field, well-entrenched in the DRS train that started with Aston Martin's Lance Stroll in 10th. Sensing no way through, McLaren gambled, tried something different, and pit Daniel Ricciardo for hard tires.
Did that work out for him? No, not really. Ricciardo couldn't make much progress. In Ricciardo's position, however, it was worth a shot. Now, if we compare that with where Esteban Ocon was in the race, you have to question what the thought process behind his race strategy was.
The Frenchman was stuck behind Stroll in a DRS train in 11th. To add to that, he had a 5-second time penalty for an unsafe release during his pitstop. Unless Ocon tried something different, the penalty meant he was going to drop further down the order in the classification. Yet, Alpine did nothing. No pitstops, no change in strategy, nothing different.
They let Ocon run through the race and ultimately classified behind both Lewis Hamilton and Pierre Gasly. If Ocon had been pitted for softs or even mediums later in the race, would he have been able to capitalize on that? Maybe, maybe not. What was a certainty, however, was Ocon scoring nothing if he didn't do something different in the second stint.
That is the difference between Alpine and McLaren. The latter tried something different, knowing full well that it was pointless to sit still. Alpine, on the other hand, did nothing. That is the difference between even a top midfield team and Alpine. And this is while we are not even mentioning the disparity in speed suffered by the team.
Alpine might just be a strong midfield team, but anything beyond that requires a complete change of philosophy, which is not going to happen anytime soon.
Will Fernando Alonso even be motivated to fight in the midfield mess?
Fernando Alonso was very happy with his return to F1 last season because it was something that he has missed. Having said that, it was always clear that he had not returned to be a midfield contender. Rather, he had come back to compete.
Sadly, this season, due to one thing or the other, that pleasure has been taken away from him. Reliability is not the only issue. The bigger issue is the stagnation of the team in the midfield. This is where it was last season when Fernando Alonso, or his teammate, dragged the car to Q3 occasionally and scored a few points.
While that is rewarding for sure, there are far too many variables in the midfield. The first is that luck can play a huge role. The second is that progress through the field is not easy and sometimes not even possible. Fernando Alonso suffered from bad luck in Australia with the timing of the safety car and then in Imola when the spinning Haas of Mick Schumacher ended his race.
After a point, these disappointments start taking a toll on the driver. Especially one that has been driving for close to two decades and has achieved so much. The 2022 season has been without a doubt mentally taxing for Fernando Alonso. He has not had the results that he deserves and as a result, he has even sounded deflated at times.
Can a season fraught with difficulties like these and no signs of a swift turnaround in sight push Fernando Alonso away from staying in Formula 1? Maybe, maybe not, but it is surely something worth keeping in mind.
