Alonso: If we win the title, it will be a miracle

4 October, 2012

Fernando Alonso at Suzuka

Oct.4 (Ferrari) Fernando Alonso faced the media in the Scuderia Ferrari team tent in the Suzuka paddock, with the hot topic being the recently announced driver moves for 2013 and the current state of the championship, with six rounds to go.

“I was a bit out of the normal world since Singapore, so I didn’t know everything that had been happening, apart from Hamilton signing for Mercedes and Perez for McLaren,” admitted the Alonso. “But I didn’t hear what they said or what reasons were given. I think it’s normal for drivers to change, as part of their career. When the rumours started, I had said I felt it was good for Lewis to move on and for McLaren, they have experienced this before, with Prost leaving and Senna, then me, now Lewis.”

“It’s fourteen years since McLaren has won a Constructors’ championship, sometimes in years when they have had the best car and I’m sure Lewis wants to win. He did a great job with McLaren, winning races and a title and he is considered one of the best drivers. I expect him to be very competitive next year at Mercedes and a real contender for the championship,” mused the Ferrari driver.

All that is in the future, as for this year the world championship title battles are still very open.

“It’s a little miracle that we are leading the championship at the moment,” declared Fernando. “We have come a long way since the first six races, when we were not even getting to Q3 and were 1.5 seconds slower than the best. Now the car has improved and we are more regularly on the podium and we are more optimistic, but we have to see what we can do from now to the end. If we win the title, it will be a miracle, but if we don’t we will have done our best, because I believe that up to this point, we have had 14 perfect races,” said Alonso.

“So we must make no mistakes in the last six, keep calm and bring home as many points as possible on Sunday: sometimes we will be fourth, sometimes second. Depending on the race, depending on which rivals are doing what, we will see if we are aggressive or defensive in the races. In Singapore for example, we were aggressive at the start to make up for a bad qualifying, but in the final stages Button and Vettel were too far ahead so there was no point taking risks anymore,” said the Spaniard.

The media are keen to suggest that this is Alonso’s best season in F1 in terms of his driving, but the man himself would not make such a bold statement.

“Every year you improve and learn from your mistakes,” he said. “So far this year we have been quite consistent and got the maximum out of the car, so I am very pleased with this, not just personally in terms of my driving, but also for the team, because here at the track, in all areas, we maximised the points. So far, the whole package, driver, team, strategy, tyre management have benefited from what we learned last year.”

Subbed by AJN.

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3. Alonso hot tip to win 2012 F1 world title
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