At age 3, a little boy from Oviedo, Spain started to race go-karts. 35 years later, the racing world knows his name, Fernando Alonso. Alonso has won two F1 world championship titles. If you’ve read my previous piece on Ayrton Senna, you’d know two isn’t much compared to statistical greats like Schumacher and Hamilton. However, there’s more to Alonso than the record books show. Alonso popularised the sport of F1 in a country which did not have much interest in racing at all.
After some strong showings in lower categories of racing, the Spaniard reached the pinnacle of motorsport in 2001 with the Minardi team. Minardi’s car was generally slow but Alonso showed flashes of brilliance in the backmarker car, impressing Renault boss Flavio Briatore. For 2002, the 21 year old was signed as a test driver for Renault. As a test driver, Alonso covered thousands of laps, learning more and more with each one. The next year, Alonso was promoted to a race seat and he showed exactly why.
In only his second race driving the Renault R23 at the Malaysian Grand Prix, Alonso took his first career pole position. He went on to score his first and second podium finishes at Malaysia and the next race at Brazil. Later that year, Alonso won his first ever race at the Hungarian Grand Prix, aged 22 years. At the time, this was a world record for the youngest driver to claim a race victory in F1. Alonso continued with Renault for the next year as well. He scored four more podiums in 2004. 2005 proved to be an enormous year in Alonso’s career. The Renault R25 was slightly slower than the McLaren MP4-20 but had bulletproof reliability. Alonso fought for the title with McLaren’s young talent Kimi Räikkönen. Let’s remember that for the past five years, Ferrari and Michael Schumacher dominated the sport. Alonso and Räikkönen put an end to that. With seven race wins, Alonso won the championship and at the time, was the youngest ever champion. More success followed in 2006 for the Spanish driver as the Renault R26 was very competitive. Alonso battled Ferrari’s Schumacher for the title and came out on top to win his second championship in as many years. However, he was disillusioned with Renault and signed a contract with McLaren for three years from 2007 onwards to replace Räikkönen.
Alonso’s move to McLaren turned out to be a major misstep. The McLaren MP4-22 was extremely good in all facets and only Ferrari’s F2007 could compete with it. For 2007, Alonso’s teammate was to be a young British debutant called Lewis Hamilton. Alonso was expected to show Hamilton the way. However, over the season, both McLaren drivers fought tooth and nail. The intense infighting between Alonso and the rookie Hamilton coupled with some fantastic driving gave the 2007 world championship to Ferrari’s Kimi Räikkönen by just one point. Allegations of favouritism ruined Alonso’s relationship with the team. A major spying scandal left McLaren embarrassed and disqualified from the championship. Alonso left the team and returned to Renault for 2008. Over the next two years, Renault produced two mediocre cars and Alonso could only manage two race wins over two years. The Spaniard moved to Ferrari for 2010 to once again replace Kimi Räikkönen.
Fernando Alonso had really entered his prime years by 2010. Ferrari produced a competitive car, but was still slightly behind Red Bull and McLaren. However, Alonso’s smart driving put him well into the championship battle. 2010 saw a five-way battle for the world championship featuring Alonso, Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber along with McLaren’s Hamilton and Jenson Button. However, strategical errors from Ferrari in the final race meant Alonso lost the championship to Vettel from an advantageous position and came second, with five victories. 2011 was dominated by Red Bull and Vettel as Alonso only managed fourth place in the championship. Ferrari’s 2012 car was again not on the level of the main challengers for the championship. The 2012 season was a modern classic as Alonso was once again involved in the battle for the championship. The Spaniard dragged a very weak car into amazing positions. His 2012 season is widely regarded as one of the greatest individual performances in F1 history. Alonso lost the championship by a meagre 3 points to Vettel after a year of truly magnificent performances in a slower car. 2013 was once again dominated by Vettel as Alonso finished a distant second place, winning his last ever race at his home race, the Spanish Grand Prix. In 2014, Ferrari produced a very mediocre car. Alonso was partnered by fellow champion Räikkönen and destroyed him over the season (Alonso had 161 points compared to his teammate’s 55!).
Alonso’s relationship with Ferrari went down the gutter and he moved back to his former team McLaren. The Spaniard had high hopes for this team, especially with a new engine partnership with Honda. However, in a common theme for Fernando’s career, this move did not go to plan. 2015 saw a series of engine failures ruin the season for Alonso, though he still dragged the car into strong positions. Alonso remained committed to the cause but 2016 and 2017 were more of the same. Alonso performed brilliantly with a very slow car but his efforts were wasted. In 2018, McLaren used Renault engines in hope of a resurgence. However, once again, the car was quite slow. Alonso, disappointed, announced his retirement from F1 at the end of 2018.
Well, I did call Fernando the definition of versatility in the title. Why? Over his entire F1 career, Alonso has driven a variety of extremely different cars, fast and slow, bulletproof and unreliable, with strong rivals like Schumacher, Räikkönen, Hamilton and Vettel. He has not once underperformed or been “mediocre” or “slow”, even towards the very end. That’s not all though. Alonso has won the prestigious endurance race, the 24 Hours of Le Mans two times with Toyota. He has also driven in America’s Indy 500 race twice. He has won the 24 Hours of Daytona as well. He competed in the dangerous Dakar Rally this year and the Spanish great has shown no signs of decline.
All of Fernando Alonso’s rivals, teammates and bosses have spoken praise about the Spaniard’s abilities behind a steering wheel. Alonso is fiercely competitive, very intelligent and has amazing dedication. Statistics may not show Alonso’s pure and raw talent but he is certainly one of the greatest ever drivers to grace the world of motorsports. Fernando Alonso is undeniably a modern legend of sport.
Amazing article. It has triggered a person who is not into cars and race to learn more on that!!