McLaren delighted with Fernando Alonso’s 7th-place finish

At the end of Q2, something rare could be seen in the McLaren garage: smiles! Indeed, Fernando Alonso was able to deliver one of his trademark performances to make it into Q3. The Spaniard didn’t stop at this initial achievement as he was also able to finish 7th, despite choosing to do only one lap during this session.

This can only provoke the satisfaction of his sporting director, Eric Boullier: In qualifying, for his home Grand Prix in Barcelona, Fernando executed a perfect lap to finish 7th for tomorrow’s race. Bravo amigo!

After his catastrophic start to the weekend, Fernando Alonso managed to lift his head and deliver a very fine performance when it mattered: « Today is one of those days where everything goes well and we’re even able to exceed our expectations. I am clearly happy and surprised after the way our weekend started and our qualifying results so far this year. We weren’t even thinking about a 7th place. »

It is in this context that the comparison can be cruel for his teammate. Indeed, the gap between the two McLaren drivers was five-tenths in Q1. This was enough to create a huge gap on the grid since the Belgian will have to settle for 19th place on the grid.

The rookie was all the more perplexed since his weekend had started off rather well, without any problems: « I don’t really know what happened today. Yesterday I was comfortable and confident in the car, satisfied with the performance. Everything was going in the right direction. It’s a shame because we weren’t able to translate it into qualifying. I think the potential was clearly there to move on to Q2. It seems we’ve lost a bit of performance compared to yesterday, and right now, there really aren’t any explanations. »

Now it remains to be seen if Fernando Alonso will finally be able to reach the checkered flag for the first time this season. Before heading to the United States for his Indianapolis 500 challenge.