Why Fernando Alonso is Still the Best Driver on the F1 Grid

It is fair to say that Fernando Alonso is currently experiencing his worst run in Formula 1 since re-joining McLaren in 2015. When I say worst run, I am talking purely in results form not his own personal performance. At the Spanish GP, Alonso pulled out the best qualifying performance seen by anybody in a long time, getting his McLaren-Honda into Q3. Even more amazingly, he ended up starting in 7^th. Although the race pace was still not there for Alonso, his performance in qualifying showed just how good the double World Champion still is.

It has not just been this race weekend that has showed his unquestioned talent, he has shown this dating back to the end of his Ferrari career, when that car was not as good as it should have been. Even during his second stint at Renault between 2008 and 2009, where the car was not on the same level as McLaren and Ferrari, he still managed to score two victories. 

When Alonso debuted with Minardi in 2001, everyone could see how special a driver he was. Though not scoring any points that year, he was constantly quicker than team mates Tarso Marques, and then Alex Yoong, recording a best finish of 10^th at the German GP. Getting more out of his car than people would have expected saw the Renault team sign him up for 2002 as a test driver, before promoting him to a race seat for 2003. Though the team were on the up, they were no match for the power of McLaren, Ferrari and Williams. This did not stop Alonso becoming the youngest driver to score a pole position at the Malaysian GP. He then became the youngest driver to win a race the following year at the Hungarian GP, again in a car that was improving along with its star driver. This progression was complete with his two World Championships in 2005 and 2006. A third title should have followed at McLaren, unfortunately, inter-team politics and a bad attitude cost Alonso and the team that year.

That was the last year that Alonso had a genuine front running car. Two backwards years at Renault saw him more to Ferrari in 2010, which should have been a match made in heaven, with multiple titles for the Spaniard. 2010 should have been the first had it not been for Red Bull’s Vettel storming through at the end of the season. After that, the Alonso that we see now was born, the man that could get more out of a car than anybody else. The 2012 Ferrari was not a title fighter by any stretch of the imagination, yet Alonso not only won races in that car, but kept the title fight going to the final race of the year. As at McLaren previously, the relationship between team and driver went sour, and Alonso re-joined McLaren, who had teamed up with once again with Honda.

This current spell that Alonso is going through with McLaren-Honda however, is the one that is showing that he is the best on the current grid. Yes, you have Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel who are battling at the front and providing some fantastic racing for the fans. Their talent is undeniable, but neither driver has performed in Formula 1 quite like Alonso. In a poor car, he still manages to score points and put himself in positions that other drivers would not be able too. What proves he is the best however is that, this season, despite having the second slowest car, he is still averaging 12^th on the grid, an achievement that nobody else on that grid would be able to achieve in that car. The upcoming Indy 500 race that he will contest, will provide further proof if needed that Fernando Alonso is not only the best in F1, but one of the best in the world right now.    

Could Sauber Become the New Honda Works Team?

During the Russian GP weekend, it was announced that Sauber will be using Honda power units for the 2018 season, meaning their 8-season association with Ferrari will come to an end. It was also heavily speculated that the team would be using McLaren gearboxes from the 2018 season, though team principle Monisha Kaltenborn said the team was not ready to make any announcement. This new partnership is a good deal for both the Sauber team and Honda itself, leading some people to speculate whether Honda could take a controlling stake in the Swiss team, and make it the works Honda team, something which has not been seen since the 2008 season. 

This speculation has solid ground when looking the recent history of the Sauber team, especially in the last ten years. In the early 2000’s, Sauber were consistently “best of the rest” behind Ferrari, McLaren and Williams, securing 4^th in the constructors’ championship in 2001. This achievement would not be seen again for the team due to the heavy investment that other teams were putting into their cars, which Sauber could not match. However, their heavy investment into their wind tunnel technology made BMW take notice and buy a controlling stake in the team, re-branding it BMW Sauber. Under this guise, the team enjoyed a lot of success even a sole victory at the 2008 Canadian GP thanks to Robert Kubica. Peter Sauber then bought the team back from BMW in late 2009 after the German car manufacturer decided to pull out of the sport.

Since 2010, the team has struggled financially and made no secret of this. There have been many times since the team’s reincarnation where they were on the brink of folding and disappearing from the sport. Investment from Longbow Finance S.A in 2016 has secured the teams future. On the track this season though, fortunes have not changed with the team being the slowest of the 10 on the grid, using old Ferrari engines. This new deal will see the team use the latest Honda engine, not a year old one and have a brand new gearbox supplied by McLaren. This deal can only help the small Swiss team but also help Honda and McLaren.   

Personally, I believe it will take some pressure off Honda, who have simply let McLaren down since their partnership renewed in 2015. Progress has been slow and many are running out of patience, none more so than Fernando Alonso. With an extra team to supply, it will give Honda the opportunity to test more new parts and upgrades to make itself a force in Formula 1 again and at the same time, help put McLaren back at the sharp end of the grid. In making itself a force again, the Sauber would be the perfect team for Honda to buy out and make itself a fully operational Formula 1 team again. This would all boil down to Honda turning around its engine performance though. The new involvement of Honda in Sauber shares similarities with BMW’s involvement which could point to a similar scenario of Honda becoming a works F1 team again.  

Russian GP 2016

7th Heaven for Rosberg

In cruising to yet another victory at the Russian GP, Nico Rosberg entered a very exclusive club, becoming only the 4th driver in the sport’s history to achieve the feat of winning 7 races in a row. Reigning World Champion Lewis Hamilton finished a distant 2nd to Rosberg again, but mounted a brilliant drive from 10th after another engine issue in qualifying kept him out of the pole position shootout. Kimi Raikkonen scored Ferrari's 700th podium in Formula 1 after finishing 3rd behind the two Mercedes. Valtteri Bottas couldn't make the most of a front row start as he finished 4th, with his team mate, Felipe Massa bringing his car home 5th. There were welcomed points for McLaren and Renault as Fernando Alonso and Kevin Magnussen finished 6th and 7th respectively, both scoring their first points this season. The Haas team returned to the points with Romain Grosjean finishing 8th ahead of Force India's Sergio Perez and McLaren's Jenson Button who finished in 10th, and set a new record for points scoring in consecutive seasons - his 17th point scoring season in succession. However, the main talking point of the race was again Dani Kvyat and Sebastian Vettel. It was handbags in China in my view but Russia was a different story as Vettel crashed out as a result of Kvyat. 

Rosberg once again got a stunning start and managed to avoid the chaos behind him. In China, Kvyat had plenty of space to put a move on Vettel, much to the Germans annoyance at the manner and speed at which it was done. Fast forward two weeks to Russia, and Kvyat is charging off the grid into turn one. They made it through into turn 2 and Kvyat just couldn't slow down and went straight into the back of Vettel. To make matters worse, going through turn 3 Kvyat hit Vettel again, causing the former World Champion to spin off into the barriers. Vettel was understandably furious with the young Russian, racing in front of his home fans, and gave a foul mouthed assessment of the situation. Further back more collisions occurred which saw both Esteban Gutierrez and Nico Hulkenberg collide with each other, taking them both out of the race. With another chaotic start and bits of car everywhere, the safety car made and appearance whilst all of the debris was cleared up. To make matters worse at Red Bull, the accident that Kvyat caused had a horrible effect on team mate Daniel Ricciardo's race, who had to make an emergency stop under the safety car and had to queue up behind Kvyat. Effectively, the whole team’s race was over by turn 1. As always however, there are drivers who benefit from this kind of situation. This time round it was Alonso and Magnussen, who qualified right down the field but were able to score good points.  

Despite all of this, the accomplishment of Nico Rosberg should not be overlooked. Rosberg's performance was nothing short of perfect, as it has been all season. Many people point to Lewis' reliability issues, but I believe that Rosberg has the edge over Hamilton regardless. Hamilton has been very sulky about the situation, but he must not forget the issues that have plagued Rosberg in previous seasons. I'm not implying that Rosberg would have won any championships during that time, but he may have been closer. Rosberg should enjoy the wave of luck he is finally getting in F1 while he can, because like the great Murray Walker says, anything can happen in F1, and it usually does.   

Formula Junior Starts in 2016

Maybe at some point in 2016 we will see a start to a race where the first corner is not littered with Formula 1 car parts. I can't remember a season or streak of races where so many collisions have occurred during the first few corners, or opening laps. Australia saw the heavy incident involving Alonso and Gutierrez which came further into the race. From Bahrain through until Russia, the starts to the pinnacle of motor racing have been nothing short of something you can view in GP2. Everybody enjoys close action racing going into turn 1, but the results lately have robbed fans of potentially thrilling races. Incidences in Bahrain involving Hamilton and Bottas stand out, and in China there were bit of front wing flying everywhere. Russia though was the tipping point. Kvyat steaming into Vettel like that was nothing short of amateur, and Vettel had every right to react in the manor he did. I think his interview during the race was handled in a brilliant manor by Vettel as he could have easily stood and slated Kvyat. He remained professional in my opinion and rightly went to speak to Red Bull boss Christian Horner. I believe the problem is many drivers are being thrown into F1 at such a young, inexperienced age. Yes, drivers such as Vettel, Alonso and Hamilton started at a young age, but had been through several racing formulas beforehand. Kvyat for example raced in GP3 for one season and came into F1. Max Verstappen didn't even do that before becoming F1's youngest ever driver. Although he will undoubtedly become World Champion one day, I think he should have had more junior formula experience, as is the case with many others. On Kvyat however, he can take some comfort in the fact that Romain Grosjean was being labelled as a liability on the circuit, and how he is one of the finest drivers out there. Just something to think about.

The Unflappable Finn

What is it about Finnish drivers in F1 and their inability to crack under pressure? As far as I can remember, the only time I've seen a Finn flap in F1 was back in 1999 when Mika Hakkinen spun at the Italian GP and lost it. That was a one off. I bring this up because watching Valtteri Bottas at the Russian GP was a joy to behold. Starting P2 on the grid with the faster Ferrari's behind him (thanks to Vettel's grid penalty) and obviously Hamilton who would charge through the field. Vettel obviously never managed to get near Bottas, but when Hamilton did he put him under enormous pressure which many drivers would crack under. Bottas never once showed a sign of cracking and it took a brilliant move by Hamilton to get past the unflappable Finn. Unfortunately for Bottas, his Williams just wasn't quick enough to get in a podium fighting place, but his race as a whole was brilliant.