Alonso did well in the first part of qualifying and came in second. But as the competition got tougher, he dropped to fifth place in both the second and third parts of qualifying. However, he was pleasantly surprised by the speed of the upgrades on Aston Martin’s car.
During Friday’s practice in Suzuka, Alonso used the older car package while his teammate, Lance Stroll, tested the new upgrades. Later, both drivers switched to the new upgrades, which focused on changing the sidepod and floor areas of the car.
Alonso said, “Yesterday I had the old package. Today is the new package. Tonight, we will have all the data to confirm that and quantify the improvement, but everything felt good in qualifying.” He found it a bit unexpected to be so competitive.
He added, “Just a couple of hundreds from [Sainz’s] Ferrari, Leclerc [is] behind us, Piastri behind us and Mercedes. So we were here six months ago – 1.5 seconds from pole position. And now we are four-tenths.”
However, Alonso isn’t sure if he can maintain fifth place in the race. He expects strong competition from McLaren’s Oscar Piastri, as well as Lewis Hamilton and George Russell from Mercedes, and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.
He said, “Looking back at the first three races, we are very strong in Saturday, [but] not so strong on Sunday, we are maybe out of position to be in the top five.” He’s prepared to fall back if necessary and is open to whatever happens in the race.
Alonso also mentioned that while qualifying is very close this year, Red Bull still seems to have an edge in race pace. He believes that on Saturday, some problems may be masked due to factors like tire grip, but the true pace of the cars is revealed on Sunday during the race.
