Alonso calls for massive changes in Russia

In the early stages of last Sunday’s race in Shanghai, Alonso and his teammate Jenson Button were mingling in the top five for a stint but it proved to be futile as their clear lack of pace caused more competitive cars to easily pass them as the race progressed. 

The two-time World Champion admitted that they lack power and added that since the entire grid finished the Chinese Grand Prix without any retirements it was harder to gain any places, unlike the two opening races. 

“It was a bit of a boring race for us,” the 36-year-old explained. 

“You’re always disappointed when you don’t finish in the points, we expected a bit more. For sure we expected to be in the top ten but that was not possible. No one had any issues, whereas in the race I watched from the pit all there were car parts all over the track, big chaos in the first lap.”

“Here everyone finished the race and we weren’t quick enough to finish inside the top ten. We have to improve for the next race.” Alonso, who finished 12th, also revealed that the safety car that was deployed early in the GP might have halted their race strategy slightly as teams around them gained one extra pit-stop. 

“We couldn’t take advantage of the safety car period,” he said. 

“Our strategy was to start with the soft tyre to go a bit longer in the first stint, but then we lost the 25 seconds and the others made time by pitting early and then being helped by the safety car. They had a free pit stop, we didn’t, that didn’t help but the pace was not great either,” he added.