Alonso blames Pirelli for ‘worst Saturday of 2013’

2013 British Grand Prix

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Fernando Alonso says Pirelli’s choice of tyres for the British Grand Prix is partly to blame for Ferrari’s struggles.

“Really disappointing – we were not competitive all weekend,” said Alonso after qualifying today.

“It’s not normal to see one Ferrari out of Q3, the other one tenth in Q3. But is what we deserve, we were not good enough today.

“Obviously the race is still very long, anything can happen, we will do our best to recover position. But it was a bad Saturday.”

Asked why Ferrari could only manage tenth and twelfth on the grid he said: “I think we didn’t improve the car enough in the last four or five races, we brought new parts that maybe didn’t deliver what we expect from them. The others they doing a fantastic job.”

“Pirelli’s choosing medium and hard, continuously for every race, which we know that only helps two teams, and we need to keep working.”

“We can consider this the worst Saturday of the season so far, having never finished so far down, but now we must react immediately to try and return to the form we showed at the start of the year,” he added.

“We definitely expected a lot more here, because this is a track that suits our car’s characteristics better than others.

“In Q3, we hesitated a bit over tyre choice: we went out on the hards because they had worked well in free practice this morning and in Q1. Then we switched to medium with the idea of just coming back to the pits if it did not go well but then we decided to finish the lap and nevertheless our rivals were quicker.”

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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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115 comments on “Alonso blames Pirelli for ‘worst Saturday of 2013’”

  1. “Pirelli’s choosing medium and hard, continuously for every race, which we know that only help two teams, and we need to keep working.”

    I’ve said it millions of times: Pirelli’s tyre choices should have been made for every race before the season got underway. A situation like this where Lotus and Ferrari are criticizing the tyre choice was a disaster waiting to happen – one that could have been avoided very, very, very easily imo.

    1. Totally agree. The issue here is that once the season is underway, personal preferences (by those at Pirelli) dictate what tyres they think they should bring to each race weekend. Whether they admit it or not, they can’t ‘un-know’ that the harder tyres suit Mercedes/Red Bull. I don’t believe they are necessarily favouring any teams, but I can see why people would come to that conclusion (I say this as a Ferrari fan).

      1. There isn’t a shred of evidence that the harder tyres suit Mercedes/Red Bull more than Ferrari.

        1. That’s not the point! Alonso believes Pirelli are favouring two teams, which wouldn’t be the case if the tyres would be allocated pre-season.

          1. @andae23 do you believe in a world where Alonso wouldn’t have just said “Pirelli’s choosing medium and hard, continuously for every race, which we know from last year, only help two teams…” had that been the case?

            If so, I have a bridge I’d like to sell you ;)

            This is a non-story.

          2. @hwkii I … I … what? :P

        2. I think it’s evident that they do, as tend Lotus/Ferrari have better wear rates in races than Red Bull/Mercedes when the softer tyres are used. That’s not to say I don’t think it’s Ferrari’s or Lotus’ responsbility to get their cars to work with the harder compounds…

        3. Are you serious??? Just look back at the results those two teams have had in the previous races where those tyres have been used and then ask yourself if there is a “shred” of evidence.
          Geez, some people man seriously!

          1. I repeat, there isn’t a shred of evidence that the medium/hard tyres favor Red Bull and/or Mercedes over Ferrari, either in qualifying or in the race.

            In both Malaysia and Bahrain Alonso matched his best qualifying position of the season – third – on the medium tyres. He crashed out in Malaysia and had DRS problems in Bahrain, but the tyres were not a Ferrari weakness. Alonso won a very empathic victory in Barcelona on the medium/hard tyres.

            On the supersoft tyres in both Monaco and Montreal Alonso could only mange sixth in qualifying.

            Compare to Vettel – SV has five podium finishes.

            3rd on the supersoft/medium combo.
            1st on the medium/hard.
            1st on the medium/hard.
            2nd on the supersoft/soft.
            1st on the supersoft/medium.

            The Red Bull has been strong on all the different tyres. So has the Ferrari, but they’ve lost points due to non-tyre issues.

          2. @jonsan please just keep in mind that its not just the tyre’s used. Its the tyre and track combo. For example, the heat generated at a track like Catalyna would be far higher than the heat generated at a track like Silverstone. That is why the compounds change according to which track is visited.

          3. @jonsan

            Then why does Red Bull keep saying the tyres should be harder, and Lotus and Ferrari want them to be softer?

            In this instance, you are wrong. The Red Bull and Mercedes cars will work better the harder the tyres are, because they put more energy into them. The Lotus and the Ferrari are the opposite, and will in general, benefit more from softer tyres, as they are able to preserve the tyres longer.

          4. Nathan (@il-ferrarista)
            29th June 2013, 21:49

            @Joshua

            But isn’t the heat generated in Barcelona and SIlverstone pretty much the same, specially if the weather and temaparature is similar on both track..?

            I mean, both tracks are high-speed & high-G circuits, maybe Silverstone a bit more, but Silverstone has usually colder track surface beacaus of the climate.

            What your take on this?

          5. Then why does Red Bull keep saying the tyres should be harder, and Lotus and Ferrari want them to be softer?

            Ferrari does NOT want the tyres to be softer. Nor does Red Bull “keep saying the tyres should be harder”.

            Ferrari are the opposite, and will in general, benefit more from softer tyres, as they are able to preserve the tyres longer

            There’s no evidence of that happening, at least not any more often that it happens to other teams.

          6. @jonsan

            So why in the article just above, do I read Ferrari’s driver saying…

            Pirelli’s choosing medium and hard, continuously for every race, which we know that only helps two teams,

            And Red Bull does want the tyres to be harder, here are two links of them saying they want harder tyres.
            Christian Horner
            Dietrich Mateschitz

      2. The problem with that (choosing the tyres before the season), is that pirelli could not react at all to what they learn about the cars/tyres during the year. We would have had cheesecake tyres in Barcelona, and maybe would have had extra soft tyres both here, in Canada and likely at the Hungaroring.

        What would we have been saying when they got up to 5 regular stops then?

    2. I agree with you and I also think that some will inevitably see changing/adjusting tyre compounds in the middle of a season as manipulating the results, even if Pirelli have no intention of doing that.

      We must blame them and cause a fuss
      Before somebody thinks of blaming us!

      (from ‘Blame Canada’)

    3. Completely agree… otherwise it’ll never be totally transparent, as it’s like having a different set of rules week in week out.

    4. Pirelli’s tyre choices should have been made for every race before the season got underway

      You can’t do that because there just isn’t enough knowledge about the tyre at the start of the season, let alone the cars that will be putting them through their paces. This is exactly what Pirelli want the FIA to change for 2014 (i.e. some more running with 2013 spec cars early in the season) – so you’re idea may work for then, but for 2013 it just isn’t realistic.

      1. edit…”some more running with 2014 spec cars early in the season”. Sorry.

      2. @john-h Aha, but I’ve thought of that: Pirelli has data from all circuits, so if they have an indication of how durable the tyres are in comparison to last year’s tyres (which shouldn’t be too hard to figure out, given the pre-season test data), they can allocate based on that.

        And if after three races it turns out the tyres are less/more durable than expected, they can propose an alternative allocation list for the rest of the season, which will be used as long as a majority of the teams give it the thumbs up. Not a problem at all, I’d say.

        1. @andae23 Ha, you might just be onto something here. But what about 2014, the cars are going to be so different isn’t it a bit risky to front load everything? Surely the 2013 data won’t be enough. So in that case 2014, could be a special year… but then what would constitute a special year with lots of rule changes? 2015? You see where I’m going with this?

          I think the best idea I’ve heard yet is just to let each team decide which two compounds they want to bring to the race themselves. If Ferrari want to select softer tyres for the Hungaroring, then just let them do so. That way, the tyre selection is chosen to fit the car, not the car designed to fit the tyre.. which is more of a moving target (if you get what I mean).

          This would to some extent negate the problem with having a single tyre supplier (and hence acting a bit like a communist dictatorship, albeit probably unintentionally!).

          1. @john-h

            I think the best idea I’ve heard yet is just to let each team decide which two compounds they want to bring to the race themselves.

            Yes, please yes! That would be the ideal scenario, but if they for some reason don’t decide to do that (which is probably the case), the thing I’m proposing would be a good solution I think.

        2. @andae23

          so if they have an indication of how durable the tyres are in comparison to last year’s tyres (which shouldn’t be too hard to figure out, given the pre-season test data), they can allocate based on that.

          To a certain extent yes, but I think it’s not that simple. I suspect that this whole mess with the tyres is evidence that it isn’t.

          1. @Mike ok I agree, but then I refer to my next line paragraph: if for some reason they are completely off, it can’t be a big problem to change the tyre allocation. The problem with the current system is that the teams don’t have a say in Pirelli’s ‘change of philosophy’, but if the teams could actually agree with some sort of tyre allocation change (like in the system I’m proposing), claims like Alonso is making cannot be made anymore.

          2. Wait, You want the teams to agree?

            That’s very unlikely. Given that for any change, one team must lose out.

          3. @mike Uhmmmmmmmm…… yeah…. majority? :P

          4. The problem is, you have Lotus and Ferrari on one side, and Red Bull and Mercedes on the other. Haha

            I think Pirelli is in a very tricky position!

    5. I’ve said it before a billion times, there is so little difference in the cars that they cant be optimised for 4 different tyre compounds, if the FIA wanted 1 or 2 pitstops with tyre choice and management affecting the results as they say then the hard/medium choice provides that scenario, and RBR, Mercedes, did a better job of designing a car, if the FIA wanted 3 and 4 stop races then Lotus and Ferrari did a better job. I think it would be really great if we had just 1 tyre with a broad operating range and minimum degradation so the design goalposts didn’t keep moving and the drivers could race each other instead of the tyres.

    6. The medium and hard compound is definetly the right choice for Silverstone, this ins’t an excuse for qualifying behind the two Lotus (while they have been saying for weeks they were trying to improve their qualification pace). The only circuit where Pirelli have done a bad choice for the tyres is the Hungaroring, IMO.

  2. “Pirelli’s choosing medium and hard, continuously for every race, which we know that only help two teams, and we need to keep working.”

    The tyres allocated for the last four races.

    Barcelona – medium, hard
    Monaco – supersoft, soft
    Montreal – supersoft, medium
    Silverstone – medium, hard

    1) Pirelli are not “continuously choosing medium and hard for every race”.
    2) Alonso’s last race win came on the medium/hard tyre combination.
    3) Alonso did poorly at Monaco on the softest compounds, and was beaten by Vettel at Montreal on fairly soft tyres.

    As excuses go, this is very weak by Alonso.

    1. “As excuses go, this is very weak by Alonso.”

      Not just weak – demonstrably wrong.

      if it were just a matter of ‘unfair’/’conservative’ tyre selection, why was he outqualified by both Force Indias – a car notoriously gentle on its tyres ?

      1. +2

        alonso on the whinge again

    2. To play Devil’s Advocate a little, I think he’s referring to the upcoming races such as Hungary, which are also (somewhat surprisingly) on the two hardest compounds. Lotus have also moaned about this.

      1. I thought this was pretty obvious. As far as I know, the compounds were changed during the reason from soft to hard in order to reduce the number of pitstops RBR and Merc were doing.

        1. Ferrari, Red Bull and Merc have been doing the same number of pit stops.

          1. first of all you are wrong, alonso is talking about future races, and its not hard to understand that equal number of pitstops even if some cars are saving tires and going slow doesn’t mean all teams are good on tires.

          2. You should read this web site, with particular attention to the articles Keith writes on race strategy and number of pit stops after each GP. Apart from some non-tyre issues (Massa’s punctures, Alonso’s DRS stops in Bahrain) Ferrari and Red Bull have been making the same number or tyre changes per race.

          3. @jonsan

            However, the question is, does softer tyres benefit Ferrari?

            That Red Bull and Ferrari both make similar stops however, does not answer that.

    3. @jonsan, well if you are going to dig up facts to support your argument we wont read you anymore.

  3. Traverse (@)
    29th June 2013, 17:02

    It’s easy to complain and play the blame game when things don’t go your way, it’s more difficult to look in the mirror.

    1. Problem is, it is not him who should look into the mirror, because he for one delivers. It is some of the guys in Maranello who rest on their laurels expecting Alonso to perform larger and larger miracles to keep the car in front.

      Honestly, the people at Ferrari are increasingly taking advantage of Alonso’s skills and attitude. They are one lazy bunch who could not deliver meaningful updates as quickly as some other teams – who actually has less resources.

      Alonso deserves Ferrari much much more than Ferrari deserves him.

      1. I have a proposal for Ferrari. They should sack all engineers and with the saved money they should stock on a baked beans cans. I think Alonso has a couple of those before the race and blows some gases on the diffuser and that is why that car is so much faster than others in the straight line.
        Or they can keep the engineers that make a race wining capable car and get Alonso to improve his qualifying skills.

  4. Yet the quotes on bbc in this link http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/23112364 totally contradict this article .

    1. I saw an interview soon after quali and Alonso said pretty much everything Keith reported.

      1. Yet if you read the latter half of the bbc article alonso states that he isn’t complaining and it’s up to the team to sort out there issues

    2. The quotes in this article are accurate. Looks like Alonso’s doing a bit of backpedalling.

      1. Yep, it looks like that.

      2. Keith, our reporter on the track sent basically the same story than you, but his impression was that Alonso was directly blaming the team, because the new parts weren’t working.

    3. Request @keithcollantine to verify this.

    4. I think most of it is already in this article. He just leaves out the rubbish about Pirelli’s tyre choices. Which he should.

      1. I found the BBC article gave Alonso’s comments fairer justification. It came across completely different when you read the comments left out of this sites article. In the BBC article he very repeats that its not the tyres fault, but simply his team is not doing as good a job as the others.

  5. It is better to introspect self before blaming Pirelli. Alonso and Ferrari both are going backwards in qualifying.

  6. Alonso has only ever qualified on pole twice in the dry in all his years at Ferrari and one of those time was at Monza which is probably the least technical circuit on the calendar.

    At some point you have to take responsibility for your lack of qualifying pace.

  7. A bad workman blames his tools.

    1. Shreyas Mohanty (@)
      29th June 2013, 17:19

      Saying Alonso is “bad” is the same as saying a Ferrari costs a dollar. Totally ridiculous.

  8. Oh yes, like all other teams are on other tyres. The reason we have control tyres is that everybody must be even

  9. OmarR-Pepper (@)
    29th June 2013, 17:16

    Why does he blame the car now? when he produces a better performance “it’s because of him” when he lacks performance “it’s because of the car”
    and @jonsan well spotted about the tyre choice

    1. Why does he blame the car now? when he produces a better performance “it’s because of him” when he lacks performance “it’s because of the car”

      .
      Spot on.

    2. when he produces a better performance “it’s because of him” – it is a lie.
      I remember that Alonso always says “we” when he achieved a good result. Always.

      1. In this context, I believe Alonso uses the “Royal We” meaning…

  10. I think Pirelli is in a really unenviable situation. Whatever they do, there is always some team that is unhappy with them.

    Having said that, Ferrari really need to improve their qualifying performance.

    1. Mr win or lose
      29th June 2013, 23:13

      Very true. Maybe they should bring the supersoft and hard tyre to some Grand Prix in order not to favor any team (Mercedes/Red Bull or Ferrari/Lotus).

  11. It happens every year from 2011 onwards: season starts with rapidly degrading tyres, some teams and drivers start to critisize the tyres continously, Pirelli then reacts and starts to bring conservative tyre choices from the middle of the season + teams start to understand how to preserve tyres better. Result: races from entertaining (which isn’t always very good for fans) starts to become really boring (which is worse then races with severe tyre degradation). Pirelli just strugle to find the ballance and react too sensitive. For example, last years Hungarian GP – tyre choice was spot on, but this year they decided to bring medium and hard tyres instead of medium and soft. It means, that races will become boring in the middle of the season, not at the end of it.

    1. @osvaldas31: I agree with you except the example of Hungarian GP tyre choice. This year, the hard and medium are near to last year’s medium and soft.

      Hopefully the fact that next year, there will be four 2 days in-season testing and also the possibility of pre-season testing taking place at warmer locations like Bahrain and Abu Dhabi would help to avoid these kind of scenarios

      1. Yes, this year’s hard and medium are practically the same as last year’s medium and soft, but this year teams are more advanced in understanding the tyres and in tyre conservation.

  12. At some point soon The BIG LUCA will get tired of this “Domenicalli-Alonso-Massa-Pat Fry” nonsonse and will say let me fire this whole group and buy the winning package for 2016 AKA ” Horner-Vettel-Newey ” …….

    I will not be surprised if there is a package move to Maranello from RBR. That was exactly what happened in 1996 when the whole Team was revamped with a winning combo of “Brawn-Michael-Rory Byrne”

    1. But Newey was considered the best designer in 1996. All credit in 1994 and 1995 was to Schumacher not Ross Brawn or Rory Byrne. In neither 1994 or 95 did was the Benetton the best car on the grid. For all this talk about Schumacher’s “super team”, they only ever gave him the best machinery on the grid in 2001, 2002 and 2004. When he was finally given the best machinery, not only did he crush his opposition but smashed every record in the book.

  13. I hate to say it. But with Alonso and Raikkonen qualifying that low. Vettel will run away with this win aswel. Expecting a Red bull 1-2. Hamilton to finish 3rd. Vettel
    will probably have a 50+ points lead after tomorrows race.

    1. Recall that at the end of round nine (Silverstone) last year, Alonso was 29 points ahead of Vettel with good old Webber spliting the difference. If Webber (who seems more relaxed these days for some reason) can improve and take points away from Vettel then anything can happen. Keep the faith!

      1. If Webber (who seems more relaxed these days for some reason) can improve and take points away from Vettel then anything can happen

        “KERS failure Mark, KERS failure!!”
        Apologies, only joking ;)

      2. Doesn’t Webber usually have his strongest races through the mid part of the seasons. He always fades in the latter end, but strong through the middle.

        1. Do you mean, Webber fades after RBR have an unassailable lead on the constructors championship? multi,multi 22!

          1. @HoHum, no, I mean exactly what I just said

      3. @ferrox-glideh

        If Webber (who seems more relaxed these days for some reason) can improve and take points away from Vettel then anything can happen.

        Not on Vettel’s current form ;)

        1. I really thought that Webber would be faster this season without all of that metal in his leg weighing him down.

  14. But when Vettel blamed Pirelli tyres on a previous occasion, Alonso was caustic and apt in his remarks saying “those who have won easily for some years are expected to say this when they don’t win.” So, this time Alonso is saying the same??? Come on champ, we expect more from you and you simply are the best!!! If Sutil and Di Resta can do it, don’t understand why can’t Ferrari and Alonso.

  15. Alonso blames the car because the car has been a disaster in qualifying. Massa out of Q3 says everything. People keep saying that Alonso is the one to be blamed, that he should have qualified better…how do you know it? how do you know what he should have done with the car he has, with the “tools” he has? It’s beyond my knowledge why people say that Alonso is a poor qualifier, at this point, I have to ask: based on what? Do you have direct information from Ferrari? I cannot understand why some people compare his qualifying performance with the performance of those who are driving a different car. Am I the only one who has noticed it?

    I would like someone to show me facts about this matter, not just speculations.

    By the way, he blames the tyres in the same way RBR and Mercedes blamed the tyres after Barcelona, nothing more, nothing less.

    1. By the way, he blames the tyres in the same way RBR and Mercedes blamed the tyres after Barcelona, nothing more, nothing less

      Totally agree, and all the Ferrari and Lotus fans were telling the Mercedes and Red Bull fans to pipe down!! It’s just swings and roundabouts. F1 never changes ;)

    2. To be fair RBR were complaining about the tyres before qualifying even started in Melbourne. But I said this multiple times, all those teams that thought they figured out the Pirelli tyre at the beginning of the season were in for a rude awaking. If the tyres and the car are working, you get a two to three race window, before it’s someone else’s turn. This has happened every year that Pirelli has been a supplier. There is absolutely no consistency in the tyres Pirelli are making, so when it’s your turn, best make the most of it.

    3. It’s beyond my knowledge why people say that Alonso is a poor qualifier, at this point, I have to ask: based on what?

      It’s based on his qualifying record across eleven-plus seasons in F1. You might as well ask why Vettel and Hamilton have the reputation of being good qualifiers. You get the reputation of being a race-wining driver by winning races. You get the reputation of being a crash-prone driver by crashing (Hello, Maldonado) You get the reputation of being extra-special in qualifying by winning a lot of pole positions, and you get the reputation of being not-so-hot in qualifying by qualifying frequently on the third-row or lower.

      1. you forget to mention one thing , How do you get the reputation of being the best driver on the grid

        1. Win three straight championships starting in your third full season in the sport?

    4. I agree with that logic too but I would like to know your opinion about Vettel. Everybody says it’s the car not his skill. How do they know that Vettel and Weber are not “driving the wheels” off of that Red Bull?

  16. Alonso shouldn’t be saying this, but the problem is that the tyre manufacturer is having such an influence on the race results. When Hembery bemoaned that “we can’t do this because we’d be seen as favouring red bull” and the classic “do you want the championship to be boring like the end of 2012” rubbish, he should have just kept his mouth shut basically.

    It was a bit of a PR disaster, because it puts the seed in people’s minds that Pirelli have too much power in deciding the outcome of the championship… perhaps rightly so… but now Ferrari and Lotus are aggrieved not at the FIA (where they should be aiming their complaints) but Pirelli.

    1. @john-h I agree 100% to your comment below. I said it at the time, that as soon as Hembrey laid the path down stating that he didn’t want to be seen favouring another team, when he could of simply stated, we’ve had a number of tyre failure issues and we needed to rectify these, is the moment it became a political hot potato.

      When Hembery bemoaned that “we can’t do this because we’d be seen as favouring red bull” and the classic “do you want the championship to be boring like the end of 2012″ rubbish, he should have just kept his mouth shut basically.

  17. last year pirelli brought the soft and the hard ; in pirelli’s softening of the tyres this year the 2012 soft became the 2013 medium , and the hard stayed pretty much the same …in other words the tyres are almost exactly as last year
    alonso should face the fact that he needs to be a better qualifier

  18. Time for Alonso to follow Mark(I’m serious)..He’s simply is not good at Quali and his time at Ferrari has been a shambles. Vettel win tomorrow will nail the C/ship, could also see one of the black helmets reaching the podium.

  19. If Pirelli made its choices before the season stuff like this doesn’t happen. You reap what you sow. When you take a look at it Pirelli made more aggressive choices at the beginning at the season. But because of the constant attacks from the Red Bull lobby, Pirelli tried to chance the compounds. Ferrari en Lotus blocked that. It’s only logic Pirelli would find something else to ease Red Bull and Mercedes. Silverstone could easy handle soft and medium.

    That doesn’t mean I support Fer lashing out at Pirelli like this. Deal with it Ferando, you are better than this!

  20. whatever happens, Alonso always blame something or someone :(

    1. Except himself of course!

  21. Alonso was brought to Ferrari because it was believed that his technical proficiency was greater than that of Raikkonen.

    Vettel has a car with rear grip to suit his style as number one driver. Hamilton demands brakes to suit his style he gets them. Look at the results.

    Alonso on the other enjoys number one status in his team to the point that his teammate’s performances are immaterial to the team, yet he’s always complaining that something isn’t right. He can have whatever he demands but it still is never good enough despite Ferrari consistently being the highest or second highest spending team on the grid and the team being centered around Fred. Plus it’s not like he went to a shambolic Ferrari team. His first race at Ferrari he and Felipe finish 1-2.

    Maybe the problem isn’t the car it’s Alonso–who was overshadowed in qualifying by his rookie teammate in 2007 and Trulli in his time at Renault. Yes, Alonso is a stong, consistent racer, but is he in the league of Vettel and Hamilton?

    1. Notice that even Massa has more fastest laps that Lewis, and that Kimi has nearly double the fastest laps than Lewis. What is this league of which you speak? Anyone who has won or come close to winning a world championship in F1 is in the same league. Including Alonso.

      1. Kimi went to a Newey McLaren in his second year in the sport then parachuted into Schumacher’s ride at Ferrari. Not to mention that Kimi began in the sport in 2001, while Hamilton in 2007, so naturally Raikkonen’s record should be more impressive.

        No-one has ever doubted that Kimi has raw pace, but he’s inconsistent and never been a particularly outstanding qualifier. There’s also a difference between putting together the fastest lap of the race on lap 55 and putting everything together for one special lap at the death in Q3.

  22. There must be some people around here who could extract more than Alonso in qualifying in order to know that he should do better. Oh come on don’t you see that the race will be fascinating for the first 5 laps and then total predictability. Now about “parts that do not deliver the expected improvement” I don’t know what to make of this, last year was the tunnel and now they use the Toyota one, this year what is it to blame?
    And another thing I have always been a supporter of Massa but 3 crashes in 3 races is totally unacceptable. If Ferrari falls that short from Red Bull on the technical department maybe it is time to strengthen their driver line up by signing Kimi for 2014… It is an exciting prospect! don’t you think?

  23. Don’t you think Fernando looks awfully tired in the photo?
    I wonder if there are internal pressures at Ferrari that are putting more strain on him than just the racing.

    1. I see ” V for Vengeance”, wonder if it will work?

  24. What about the car? According to you, the car has nothing to do with the final result. It seems that no matter what car Alonso drives, he must win a lot of pole positions. Sorry, I cannot understand this reasoning. As I said previously, “I cannot understand why some people compare his qualifying performance with the performance of those who are driving different cars”.

    1. Sorry, I forgot to click the “reply” button. I was trying to reply to @jonsan.

    2. Alonso has a reputation as a superb racer but a little off the boil in quali. It’s there for a reason, I’m not entirely sure why, but it might have something to do with his head to head in 2007 and the fact this team mates since then haven’t provided any sort of benchmark.

      He’s still the all round best driver on the grid, if that’s any consolation.

    3. It seems that no matter what car Alonso drives, he must win a lot of pole positions.

      He should certainly win some. Alonso has not spent his career in rubbish mid-field cars. He’s spent almost his entire career driving very good cars for top teams – the title winning Renault’s, the McLarens, the Ferrari’s. Not Saubers or Force India’s. These cars have been good enough for him to win 32 GP’s and 90 podiums – which is quite a lot! It strains credulity to suggest that, year after year and with several different teams, his cars are always good in races but poor in qualifying. The simplest and most plausible explanation is that Alonso himself is good in races but poor in qualifying.

      1. Just some examples: 2005- six pole positions; 2006- six pole positions.

        I know what his reputation is, but I’m talking about facts, not speculations. Hamilton has the reputation of being the fastest driver in F1 and one of the best qualifiers if not the best. Talking about head to head qualifying results in 2007: LH 9 – FA 8. Yes, Hamilton was a rookie, but Alonso wasn´t in his best year (Hamilton wasn´t in his best year in 2011), he didn´t seem to be as focused as he should be and at some point of the season his team was racing against him…by the way, Massa got 6 pole positions that year.

        I don´t know who is the best qualifier, I would need to see all of them in the same car, under the same circumstances. Maybe Alonso is not the best qualifier but facts show that he is not so far behind. He is in no way a poor qualifier.

        Do you think he is a poor qualifier? Do you think Ferrari has been a “Pole Position car” during these years? Ok, show me the evidence you have.

        1. I don´t know who is the best qualifier, I would need to see all of them in the same car, under the same circumstances.

          Why not say “I don’t know who is the best driver, I would need to see them all in the same car under the same circumstances”? After all, it’s possible that Charles Pic is actually by far the best driver on the grid today.

          Highly unlikely, but it is possible, and we can only say for certain if we see all the drivers in the same car under the same circumstances. Yes?

          I’m talking about facts, not speculations.

          And I’m telling you the facts are that Alonso’s rate of winning pole (10.8%) and rate of qualifying on the front row (18%) are distinctly low for a “great” driver. Compared to a Prost or a Senna, or a Schumacher or a Stewart, or a Vettel or a Hamilton, Alonso’s qualifying record is weak. That’s a fact, not speculation.

          1. I asked you to show me the evidence. What kind of evidence is ” the rate of winning pole”? you keep ignoring the influence of the car and I have to disagree with you. Obviously you can think whatever you want.

            And no, I don´t think Charles Pic is the best driver, but it is impossible for me to say who is the best qualifier. Well, Hamilton cannot be the best qualifier because Alonso is a poor qualifier and considering that it was “LH 9- FA 8” in 2007, Hamilton is close to be a poor qualifier… Vettel maybe? Actually, it doesn´t make sense to me. I’m just following your reasoning.

      2. @jonsan, sorry but once again it’s tyres, MB have the fastest tyre warmup rate and the pole but they will probably have more degradation in the race with overheating tyres if they don’t drive below their potential, RBR probably have the right balance but Ferarri and Lotus might be able push all race long and be on the podium, especially if it’s warm and sunny for the race, if there’s a heatwave they might even win.

  25. Some people seem to be under the impression that prior to this year, it was the standard practice for Pirelli to bring the same tyres to each GP on the calendar as they had used in the previous year.

    That is not actually what happened though.

    Australian GP
    2011 soft/hard
    2012 soft/medium
    2013 supersoft/medium

    Canadian GP
    2011 supersoft/soft
    2012 Supersoft/soft
    2013 supersoft/medium

    Hungarian GP
    2011 supersoft/soft
    2012 soft/medium
    2013 medium/hard

    Belgian GP
    2011 soft/medium
    2012 medium/hard
    2013 ????

    1. As the tyres are getting softer every year it actually looks pretty consistent.

  26. Anele (@anele-mbethe)
    30th June 2013, 0:24

    considering Ferrari spend as much as redbull and Alonso is the ‘best’ driver its rather pathetic they can’t sort out their qualifying

  27. It’s always the other guy’s fault. #samurai

  28. Alonso you are a double world champion. Grow up.
    Teams like Mercedes have been struggling with tyre wear all season, but they have blamed themselves for their own shortcomings instead of blaming Pirelli. Pirelli supply the same tyres to everyone, every team is dealing with the same equipment.
    If anyone should be whining for any reason it should be Paul di Resta after his underweight car.
    Although he complains enough as it is….

  29. I have to admit that I thought Ferrari had a chance here, especially after doing well in Canada, a track that shouldn’t suit them but this is very lacklustre from Ferrari.

  30. yuya (@john-locke)
    30th June 2013, 3:01

    Alonso is poor quallifer? LOL

    Due to the car.
    Button could only get 3 poles for 8 years before Brawn GP days.
    Webber could not a pole before RBR’s era (-2008)
    Raikkonen has just got 2 poles since 2008.
    Rosberg had never got a pole before 2012 season.

    Getting pole positions absolutely depends on cars….

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