As F1 gears up for the Austrian GP this weekend, Fernando Alonso has opened up about the rumours linking him to Alpine, his commitment to Aston Martin, online abuse, their timeline for upgrades, and the hard work the entire team is putting into turning their difficult 2026 season around.
Alonso has yet to decide whether he will keep racing next year. Clarifying that he would make the decision about his future after the summer break, the two-time World Champion also stated that he considers every race to potentially be his last, given his expiring contract with Aston Martin and the squad’s startling lack of competitiveness.
Meanwhile, social media platforms were abuzz with speculations in the past few weeks that Alonso might replace Franco Colapinto at Alpine—a team he won championships with in 2005 and 2006 back when it was called Renault and he drove for again in 2021 and 2022.
Alonso rubbishes Alpine rumours
Amidst Flavio Briatore confirming recently on the Beyond the Grid podcast that he will reach a decision on Colapinto’s future before the summer break and the F1 grapevine suggesting that Alpine’s Executive Advisor has his eyes set on the Spaniard, Fernando Alonso has categorically dismissed the rumours.
Speaking in a print media session ahead of the 2026 Austrian GP, the 44-year-old emphasised how both top and backmarker teams abound in rumours ahead of the F1 summer break.
Additionally, Alonso claimed that the recent hearsay is yet another example of how the outside world has weaponised Aston Martin’s ongoing struggles in 2026 to further plant seeds of uncertainty.
“I mean, there are always rumours, you know, and we’ve been very badly treated by the outside world. It’s normal.
“I mean, we are underperforming. We are in a bad moment and when summer break comes, you know, there are always rumours. There are rumours in the top teams; there are rumours also in our case because we are underperforming.”
Alonso calls the social media negativity surrounding Aston Martin in 2026 borderline abuse
Since the very beginning of the 2026 F1 campaign, Aston Martin and their new power unit supplier Honda have been battling chronic reliability and drivability issues that have resulted in eight retirements between both drivers so far.
Nonetheless, Aston Martin have managed to drag themselves up to tenth place in the 2026 Constructors’ standings, with Fernando Alonso grabbing a P10 at the end of a frenetic race on the city streets of Monte Carlo.
Reaffirming his commitment to the Silverstone-based outfit, Alonso called attention to the talented group of people who are actively contributing to the AMR26 project. Although he acknowledged the setbacks they have encountered thus far, the veteran F1 driver commented that they are sparing no effort to turn their dreadful situation around before the season comes to a close.
Furthermore, the two-time World Champion reckoned that their sluggish campaign has made them an easy target online and that the flak Aston Martin have caught on social media is borderline abuse.
“But as I said, my commitment with Aston Martin is beyond my driving time. I believe in this project, and we have the right people. We have obviously the best of the best with Adrian Newey, we have Honda.
“We started with the back foot, yes, we understand that, but we are trying to put things in place as short as possible. But, you know, we are an easy target because we are at the back. And there is all this social media and all these things and jokes that you can put on ourselves, probably that’s borderline to be abused in social media.”
Alonso agrees with Aston Martin’s timeline for upgrades
Highlighting how much effort the personnel of Aston Martin and Honda are putting into remedying the problems they are experiencing during the 2026 F1 season, Fernando Alonso proclaimed that their turnaround is only a matter of time.
While he admitted that driving an uncompetitive car and facing the media constitute a challenging exercise, the Spaniard also defended the early choice made by the higher-ups to introduce major upgrades only after the summer break. Moreover, he claimed the entire team is supportive of the decision and that they are eagerly waiting to see the upgraded AMR26 hit the track.
“We talk sometimes, you know, that we are not happy with our position. But we are hard workers. Honda are hard workers and Aston Martin, we are 1,000 people of hard workers and they go Monday to Sunday, you know, to work eight hours to fix our problems and the problem will be fixed. It’s a matter of time, and I believe in the project.
“I trust my team and we are in this together. We take one of the hardest parts of the situation because we race every week and we face the media every week and we jump in the car tomorrow and we are very uncompetitive, but, you know, our team and our leaders, they took the decision in Australia to wait until it was worth making an upgraded package, you know, for cost-efficient and things like that and we all agree on that and we are all waiting on that and we wait in the best manner possible.”
