Alonso delivers his first verdict on the new Ferrari
Fernando Alonso completed his first day of testing yesterday in Barcelona. It was an opportunity for him to make an initial assessment of Scuderia Ferrari's new weapon and to share his goals for the upcoming championship.
Absent in Jerez, Fernando Alonso discovered his new Ferrari on track for the first time yesterday. Felipe Massa’s statements last week highlighted a much more positive situation compared to the same time last year. While Alonso does not deny this, he shows a more measured optimism than his teammate: “The feeling with the car is good, more or less what I expected. From a driving perspective, it’s not like last year where we had a bad surprise during the first run. There’s still a lot of work to be done with the tires, the aero, and the new components. We need to keep accumulating the kilometers. In Jerez, we had some mechanical issues with Pedro [de la Rosa] and lost a morning, so we need to do laps here to ensure the car is sufficiently competitive,” explains the double world champion to the journalists present in Barcelona.
The F138 is therefore a better base than the F2012, which should allow Scuderia to start the championship better than in 2012. This makes Alonso optimistic for the championship: « Last year we were quite far from Red Bull, from McLaren [at the start of the season]. We were in the group with Force India, behind Lotus and Sauber, and we cannot be in that group. We must be among the winners and for that, we need to do a good job this winter. We need to arrive in a better position in Australia. Obviously, our opponents are also doing a good job. It will be interesting. What makes me optimistic for 2013 is that I fought for the championship last year with a car that wasn’t the most competitive. In the first four races, we were outside of Q3. We were 7th in China, 9th in Bahrain. So even with these problems, we fought for the title, so improving the start of the season this year shouldn’t be difficult. »
The technical regulations are essentially the same as last year, but like in 2012, there’s still a lot of talk about the tires. Pirelli has decided to make its compounds softer than before, which forces the teams once again to understand these new tires and complicates the task of fine-tuning the new single-seaters. « Having tires that only last one lap is not easy because we have many things to try. It might not be the best option for conducting tests because you only have one lap to understand the car, after which you lose one to two seconds. It’s the same for everyone. We have to try to understand these new tires better than others and try to make them last as long as possible, » analyzes the Ferrari driver.
From our special correspondent in Barcelona
