After collapsing in qualifying where he could have gone into the top three, Fernando Alonso was finally hoping to score some good points today. But like the previous two races, he had “very bad luck” in Australia.
Alonso started from 10th after the crash in Q3, chasing the extreme finish. With his thumb bandaged, the experienced Spaniard tried to take advantage of it. That worked really well, until the problem started on the track and the safety car got in the way of the Alpine strategy.
“We had very bad luck with the safety car,” Alonso said after the Australian Grand Prix. “We were moving to sixth or seventh, it would have been a great comeback. This safety car got everyone together again and our race was over,” he points out, referring to the first safety car of the race.
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The second caused more problems for Alonso, who was one of the few who had yet to stop. “We came to stop, but it was clearly too early to finish the race on the media. We’re betting on it, but it was basically the first safety car that threw a wrench in the works.”
“I am speechless,” Alonso added. “We had a huge weekend in Saudi Arabia, again now. But we took zero points in those two races. It’s hard to explain.” Despite all the misfortune, the Alps have looked very strong in the past two races, which makes Alonso optimistic. “But here’s the problem: You don’t have guarantees that you’ll be fast in the race weekend. When we’re fast, a lot of things happen to us. It’s weird. We’ve had three races and haven’t been very lucky, so we’ll be very lucky for the next 20 races,” The two-time world champion laughs.
