In a lowly P14, Fernando Alonso was left to dissect a São Paulo GP weekend that encompassed the frustrations of Aston Martin’s 2025 F1 season.
It seems that the team were struggling more and more as the race weekend progressed. Or as Alonso notes, perhaps Aston Martin isn’t getting worse, but the others are just improving faster.
Despite being fourth fastest in FP1 and sixth in the Sprint, Alonso couldn’t transfer these victories into a points-scoring result at Sunday’s GP.
“FP1 we are fast, first qualifying we are fast and then throughout the weekend they obviously put everything together and we seem that we get worse,” Alonso said.
“But it’s not that we get worse, it’s that they start quite slow.”
Despite fending off Charles Leclerc for much of the Sprint, even Alonso’s masterclasses in defensive driving can do so much.
“It was just a poor pace,” he said.
“We qualified well on the sprint and then we hold that position, but we didn’t have the pace.
“I think when Charles overtook me on the sprint, the two following laps, he was nine tenths faster. So, I mean, I was quite slow, but I started up front.”
Hard tyre gamble at the F1 São Paulo GP for Alonso and Aston Martin
With the pace for a points finish absent at the GP, the team decided to try something else.
An early stint on the hard compound tyre was the chosen strategy, something that Alonso confirmed was a conscious risk.
“Yeah, I think the hard was not a good choice, but we tried something,” he admitted.
“It was a little bit risky for sure, but if we do the same as the others, probably we just follow the others in the same strategy and we finish behind.”
“It’s worth trying something different. If it works, we can get some good points. If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t change much. So I prefer to risk this time.”
Unfortunately, their strategy failed to pay off, leaving Alonso out of the points, rather than making progress through the field.
Alonso’s place within the championship
With every driver’s and constructor’s point being so valuable, a P14 finish is a hard pill to swallow.
7th in the Constructors’ Championship and 12th in the Drivers’, the team have some work to do to improve their performance within the final few races of the season.
“I would like to have a little bit more points at this part of the championship,” Alonso noted.
“We lost 12-15 points with reliability, Monaco with the engine and China with the brakes and some of the races. So, you know, probably we will miss a couple of those points in Abu Dhabi, but we will try in the next three races to outscore them.”
