Malaysia retirement no concern for Alonso

2013 Malaysian Grand Prix

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Fernando Alonso says he isn’t concerned about the points lost due to his retirement from the Malaysian Grand Prix.

Alonso touched the back of Sebastian Vettel’s Red Bull at turn two on the first lap of the race, damaging his front wing. He and the team gambled on not bringing the car into the pits but the wing collapsed at the start of lap two, forcing him to retire.

“I am not concerned about the fact I did not score points in Malaysia, because everyone has at least two or three DNFs per season in Formula 1,” said Alonso in China.

“Although I hope not, I guess it will happen to me again this year, because of the law of averages. We need to be prepared for that and also be prepared to take any opportunity and try and score maximum points when it happens to our rivals”

“It was a shame that there was that contact at the second corner,” he added, “but as regards stopping or not stopping, I think the damage was already done. Now, we will try and be a little bit more careful, leave a bit more of a margin and hopefully it won’t happen again.”

Alonso’s remarks after the race that “it was a surprise to find [Vettel] there, almost stopped” prompted speculation that Vettel had tried to catch him out.

But Alonso scotched the idea when it was put to him in China: “That’s impossible. Because there are 22 cars on the track and you don’t know what line the drivers behind you will take.”

He added he was not concern about having failed to out-qualify team mate Felipe Massa over the last four races.

“I think he is doing a fantastic job and driving at a hundred percent,” said Alonso. “However, to talk about the last four races is a strange calculation, as it involves races from last year as well as this one and the conditions in the qualifying sessions in Melbourne and Malaysia were not so normal.

“Like I say, he is doing a good job and I hope I can qualify in front of him for a few races this year and if I manage to do that, it will need to be with a fantastic lap.”

Alonso denied that using more race-orientated set-ups on his car was the cause of Massa’s recent superiority in qualifying.

2013 Malaysian Grand Prix

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Image © Ferrari/Ercole Colombo

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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32 comments on “Malaysia retirement no concern for Alonso”

  1. What is that they’re riding past? A synthetic vegetable garden?

    1. @wsrgo looks like a painted wall to me

      1. @malleshmagdum Makes sense now..it was really confusing!! I was hypnotised for a moment..

        1. @wsrgo Hypnotised? Now I understand why Alonso crashed into Vettel :p

  2. kimiforwc2013 (@)
    11th April 2013, 12:57

    I know a Finn who is an expert at staying out of trouble.

    1. +1. He can get lost though…

  3. Alonso screwed up no question about it, but why? Is it the pressure of Massa out qualifying him or something else?

    1. No I doubt it. He was already ahead of Massa and it was Webber behind him.

      I think Massa is the one under pressure, not Alonso.

    2. It happens when you have such a big desire to beat your rivals. I totally understand him. You get blinded by your desire to beat and humiliate somebody that you end up making mistakes. He needs to cool down a bit and take it one step at a time.
      Massa is no pressure to him. So he can pull a couple of good one-lappers but he is lost when it comes to the race as it is shown in this video. 1:22
      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsvuCul_swk

  4. ‘everyone has one or two DNFs every season’. Thats one way to look at it!

    1. @malleshmagdum He’s pretty much right when he says drivers have “at least two or three DNFs per season.” The average last year was 3.16.

      1. kimiforwc2013 (@)
        11th April 2013, 13:32

        Yeah, and Kimi was one lap short in Brazil.

        1. He is referring to average and not to every single driver in every single season.

          Kimi was only one lap short last year but he didn’t win the championship.
          He had 2 DNF in 2007 but he won the championship.

          So this tells me that there is not important if you have in average 2-3 DNF but how fast your car is and how you perform in the races that you finish.
          So @malleshmagdum Alonso in my opinion is right.

      2. @keithcollantine @nomore I didnt mean that. Usually u dont see drivers commenting like this. They usually say “Thats fine, we got so many races ahead.”. They dont actually say that 2-3 retirements are ok

      3. Can Alonso afford “two or three” retirements to challenge for the title though? We’ve seen seasons where the winning driver have had zero or one retirement and only just won the title. If we look back over recent years it’s more and more clear that picking up points is vital. Lewis Hamilton had 6 non-finishes last year in what was the quickest car, and finished 4th in the Championship, yet Kimi Raikkonen had the 4th quickest car yet finished 3rd with only one non-points finish (despite running 2nd for much of that race). Over the last 10 seasons (2003-2012) the champion has had only one or two retirements except for 2010, which was a very close season. In addition to this each driver who goes on to be champion only have a few non-points finishes. 2010 again was the highest with 4. A retirement early on in the season could prove very costly for Alonso, if the field is as close as we think (and hope).

        1. Well Vettel had 3 non scores last season and won in the end, but yeah you’re right. Every point is important and another two DNF’s can sink Alonso’s hopes if he’s in the championship hunt and his rivals pull good results while he fails to score.

  5. I saw a picture of Alonso’s front wing going through the last corner before it came off in the evening standard yesterday. you could clearly see the left wing column was completely detached and about to come off any second. i am struggling to see how ferrari failed to see this.

    http://tinyurl.com/cagn477

    1. The level of damage in that pic is the same as it was all lap, from the moment it broke at turn 3. Ferrari did notice this, but seeing as it stayed attached to the car during that lap they took the decision not to pit him and hope that it held out until he could pit for dries and a new wing in one go.

  6. “everyone has at least two or three DNFs per season in Formula 1”

    Most of those though aren’t entirely unnecessary retirements: that is no way to justify Ferrari and his decision to stay out for another lap. He posed a danger to other drivers also, never mind to himself and his hopes of scoring good points.

    1. He’s doesn’t seem to be justifying anything.

      He just said that a DNF or two over a season is an average for every driver, so need to worry about the last race.

      Not everyone is on Alonso attack mode you know

      1. @todfod

        +1

        Some people just wanna find fault in everything he says… :)

        1. @puneethvb

          Some people just wanna find fault in everything he says

          How do you think us Vettel fans feel – Vettel can do no right apparently!

      2. @todfod – I interpreted that as “no biggie, it happens to everyone” but it doesn’t: most drivers would have pitted under those circumstances!

        1. @vettel1

          There was not mention of the decision regarding pitting. It was just a statement made about the championship race and whether Malaysia has really affected his chances.

          1. @todfod

            “but as regards stopping or not stopping, I think the damage was already done. Now, we will try and be a little bit more careful, leave a bit more of a margin and hopefully it won’t happen again.”

    2. Whether it be Vettel or Alonso or Hulkenberg that did as Alonso did, my sentiment would be exactly the same.

  7. Well he is right that 2 or 3 DNFs per season is more or less average. But this doesn’t change the fact that Ferrari threw away points when they didn’t need to. If the season is as close as it was last year, Ferrari may just come to regret that err in judgement.

    1. @kibbleswroth – my sentiment exactly: even though I’m clearly not a fan of Alonso’s, it was just slightly painful to watch as it was a retirement that should have never happened. As an F1 fan that made me sad, and from a safety perspective it made me angry.

    2. @kibblesworth , @vettel1
      Totally agree with you guys on that! It´s too early to worry but lets just hope it doesn´t happen again, at least not now.

    3. I wanted to mention this as well and if a driver does get let’s say 2 retirements headway to plan with, it’s not very good that he’s already half way there two races in (and 17 more to go).

  8. It´s to early to worry over just 1 retirement. There are 17 more races to go to make up for that zero and he´s right, it can also hapen to others. No big worry, he just has to shake it off and keep working hard!

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