Having arrived with the team from Maranello today, Fernando Alonso faced the media on another wet Thursday, after the one in Nurburgring a week ago. With his 30th birthday tomorrow, the Scuderia Ferrari driver was asked to look at similarities with Michael Schumacher, who was with Ferrari when he was 30, had also won two titles and had 20 race wins to his name. “I never thought to have two world championships by the time I was thirty, because I know how difficult it is to win in Formula 1 and how difficult it is to succeed here,” began the Spaniard. “I was extremely lucky to get all the wins I have to date, but I am not thinking of having seven world titles by the time I am 42. At the moment, Formula 1 is very competitive, very close and it will be very difficult for someone to be as dominant as Ferrari was with Michael, so I think seven titles is a record that will last for many years. In 2007, I missed out on a third title by one point and I also missed the chance last year in Abu Dhabi. That means that on four occasions I have been fighting for the title at the last race of the season and I have won two and lost two, which I feel is fair. Let’s see, if a fifth opportunity comes, we will see if I can win it again.”
After strong showings in recent races, the Ferrari driver was asked if the Scuderia could be dominant here. “I don’t think we can be dominant this weekend as dominant only applies to Red Bull at the moment,” maintained Fernando. “We need to have both cars consistently in the top three in qualifying and the race if we want to say that Ferrari is dominant. It was a nice surprise for us to see how competitive our car was in Silverstone and at the Nurburgring, we are pretty certain that if the temperature had been about 10 degrees higher, our performance could have been better. Hopefully here we will have a hot weekend, although the forecast does not predict that and then we can see how competitive we are here. We still need to make another step forward as Red Bull is still the reference point and yes,, we would like to see a strong McLaren to help our chances in the championship. There is no doubt that the soft and super soft tyres seem to work a bit better on our car, as we are gentle on the tyres and can maximise them for the race, running long stints with no degradation. Also in qualifying, where these tyres warm-up quickly they suit us, so we should be okay here and have a better weekend than in Nurbugring. We want the hottest temperatures possible, both ambient and track. Let’s hope on Saturday and Sunday we have 40 degrees!”
Overtaking has been a media topic all year and Fernando holds the view that one element holds the key to all the passing moves. “Even without KERS or DRS, with these current tyres we would see plenty of overtaking. Obviously the DRS is an extra help, allowing you to overtake maybe even when you have two cars with tyres in similar condition, but that would only happen about once per race. But with these tyres you get at least ten or fifteen passing moves per race.”