This weekend in Bahrain, Fernando Alonso faces his 50th Grand Prix with Aston Martin and he is doing so in the same way as in the first three races of the year: suffering. The green car is not there, nor is it expected. At least until the plan of improvements to the AMR25, scheduled for Miami or Imola at the latest, arrives and they can take a leap forward.
Fernando Alonso puts pressure on Aston Martin
All this is what has put Fernando Alonso in a very different position from what he had initially anticipated. Not only before the first race, but also with everything he was seeing last season, where the AMR24 was already quite far from the leading positions.
It is with all this that the Spaniard has asked the technical management at Silverstone for urgent measures. What was supposed to be progress in 2025 is only making them ‘settle’ for being the ninth car under normal circumstances for now. This, in terms of performance, although as far as possible the Spaniard manages to lift it up to the areas of fighting for Q3, as happened in Australia, China and Japan.
Here, however, and against all odds, it was Fernando Alonso himself who set Alpine an example. And not a bad one, quite the opposite. This is because, if we look at what happened in 2024, Alpine failed with the birth of the car and started the season as the worst team on the grid, even behind Sauber. However, if the French team has shown anything, it is that it has had a good capacity for reaction and development.
Alpine is the mirror in which to look
Thus, after hard work with the A524, Alpine recovered to finish sixth in the constructors’ championship and even achieved a double podium at the São Paulo Grand Prix. This is what Fernando Alonso is looking for: not only to wake up and react to Aston Martin, but also to manage to stabilize and maintain a position to fight to be much more than the car it is.
“I think this championship is very long, and we saw it even last year,” said the man from Oviedo. ‘Alpine started the season last and we even lapped them during the first two or three races, but they fought for sixth position at the end and even closer to us in fifth place.’
But there are many things that Aston Martin has to fix and improve in the AMR25. And not just to do better than Alpine. Because although it seems to be a more predictable car in general than the 2024, it is also much slower on the straight and, moreover, extremely sensitive to the wind.
“They are improving and we are getting worse”
“The last two years we started quite well and then fell behind and ended the season being a little less competitive,” said the Spaniard before making his debut at this weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix. ‘In a way, we want to do the opposite this year and finish the season strongly.’
He already said it last season, when the cars driven by Gasly and Esteban Ocon were improving their position in the table, while Aston Martin was declining. “I think we expected it, Alpine was ahead of us in Monaco, it was very close in Canada… They are improving and we are probably getting worse… The combination is not a good one, but I think that, as I have said many times, we have some things in the pipeline that should put us back in the right direction”.
That’s how he showed himself then and that’s how he must continue to show himself, however difficult it may seem. It’s a real thing and in an F1 like 2025 it can turn the tide. He already made it clear with his “with only two tenths you gain eight places” after the abandonment of Shanghai. And a vision is added. Nobody knows the real order beyond the top places, which do seem destined for McLaren’s MCL-39s. “The middle zone is very even, as we expected. Depending on the circuit, the order varies, and in the first races nothing is clear.” All that remains is to keep rowing.