Fernando Alonso clarified the reasons behind his troubled Formula 1 Australian GP, stating that two distinct problems in the Honda-powered Aston Martin were responsible for the stops during the race, and not battery vibrations. Still, he admitted that the vibration problem continues, as the battery insulation needs to be done differently.
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The weekend in Melbourne was difficult for Aston Martin and Honda: Alonso had to retire, while Lance Stroll finished eleven laps down. Both cars spent some time in the pits throughout the race, highlighting a complicated afternoon for the Silverstone-based team.
Alonso started 17th but had an impressive start that put him in 10th in the first two laps, a position he maintained while other drivers faced difficulties. However, he quickly fell back to 17th. The race seemed over for him on lap fifteen when he entered the pits, only returning to the track later, eleven laps down.
Later, Alonso returned to the pits again and the car was retired from the race to ‘preserve components’.
The eleven-lap stop generated speculation that Alonso had stopped to rest, as he had commented before the GP that his hands had become ‘a bit numb’ during testing after just 25 minutes behind the wheel. However, the Spaniard clarified that the first stop was caused by a problem with the car, followed by another upon returning to the track.
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“Definitely, the start and the first two laps were the most fun part of the race,” Alonso stated. “10th place for two laps was unexpected, but the start is not our problem. While others faced difficulties with the turbo or whatever they had, for us the first lap was clean. Then I fell to 17th and we had a small problem in the data that forced us to stop the car. We thought we had solved it, went back on track and another problem appeared, so we had to stop again,” he said.
The Spaniard also highlighted that the vibrations still bother him: “The feeling inside the car is the same as in Bahrain. It’s not the best feeling to drive with this level of vibration. Honda thinks the battery vibrations have been significantly reduced since Bahrain with some modifications, but this hasn’t happened in the chassis yet, because they need to insulate the battery in another way. It will take a bit more time, but we try to do our best and run as much as we can to help the team,” he added.
Regarding the Chinese GP next weekend, Alonso projected another complicated period: “I don’t expect anything different, we will have the same car, the same power unit. So it will be another difficult weekend. But we cannot give up, we need to keep trying different solutions, especially in the chassis, try to understand and improve. In the overall package, we are not yet optimized in anything due to lack of mileage. So China will be another good opportunity,” he completed.
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