Fernando Alonso was shocked at his fifth-place finish in qualifying for the F1 Hungarian GP on Saturday after the team experienced difficulties in Spa last weekend.
Alonso equalled his best qualifying performance of the season at the Hungaroring, with teammate Lance Stroll finishing just 0.017s behind in sixth place. It was a stark difference from qualifying the weekend before in Belgium, where the Aston Martin drivers didn’t manage to place ahead of any other team.
This was not a result that the team predicted, however, according to Alonso, who said the car had hardly changed since the tough weekend in Spa.
“The car was much better this weekend, you know, we need to understand why because, five days ago, six days ago in qualifying in Spa, we were 19th and 20th and now we are 5th and 6th,” he said, speaking to Sky Sports after qualifying in Hungary.
“The cars didn’t change much for anybody and it seems that this layout or these characteristics is better for our package, so we need to maximise these kinds of weekends.”
Alonso: F1 Hungarian GP qualifying performance a good sign for next season
When asked if he thought this was a result of the upgrades Aston Martin has brought to the car, Alonso was quick to praise the team’s hard work.
“This is down to the team and the effort that everyone is putting back in Silverstone and here on the race weekends,” he said.
“The front wing – [this] is maybe the first race that we properly use the front wing – is giving us that extra load in the corners and in Hungary, obviously, it’s very important.
“We are trying to understand also all the tools we have in the factory, wind tunnel, CFD, all the new people that joined the team. I think it’s the third time [we have] the Imola package and then the floor in Silverstone and then the front wing now, all three upgrades deliver exactly what we were expecting, so this is very encouraging for next year’s project.”
Alonso has not taken part in all of the sessions this weekend, sitting out of FP1 on Friday due to a back injury. Despite his impressive result, he implied that due to ongoing issues with the injury, he was not able to give his full performance.
“The car is better than my back but I will do my best tomorrow,” he said.
