Why it ‘took one minute’ for Alonso to extend F1 career with Alpine

The double world champion returned to F1 this year with Alpine after two seasons away from the sport, beginning his third stint with the Enstone team with which he won back-to-back world titles in 2005 and 2006.

Alonso agreed an initial one-plus-one year contract and his expected extension with Alpine into 2022 was formally confirmed on Thursday morning ahead of this weekend’s Belgian Grand Prix.

Continuation of the partnership came as little surprise given that F1’s 2022 rules revolution was always at the forefront of the 40-year-old’s mind when he decided to make his comeback.

The extension reaffirms Alonso’s desire to take on F1’s regulation overhaul which he hopes will level the playing field and enable the Anglo-French squad to challenge for wins and world titles in the coming years.

“In my head, it was all planned for 2022 and the new regulations,” Alonso explained.

“That’s probably why I came back to the sport as well, for next year. But then you have also the trust of the team and you need to execute good races in this first part of the season.

“So it was not in doubt, the contract was one-plus-one so at one point we had to agree for 2022.

“I’m very happy with the team and the comeback, I’m looking forward so much to next year and the team apparently is happy as well with my job so far, so we took one minute to make the decision.”

Such was Alonso’s faith in Alpine’s project, the Spaniard did not talk to any other teams despite effectively being a free agent for 2022.

Meanwhile, for Alpine, the decision to take up its option on Alonso was a no-brainer.

After an initial slow start to his comeback, Alonso found his feet and is currently enjoying a streak of six races inside the points, including his best result of the season so far with a fourth-place finish in the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Alonso’s exceptional defence against Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton to halt the seven-time world champion’s recovery drive late on in Budapest played a key role in helping teammate Esteban Ocon to seal a surprise maiden victory.

“For us it is a perfect driver line-up, amongst the strongest on the grid,” said Alpine CEO Laurent Rossi.

“It works in a hugely complementary way, with both offering raw talent and speed, yet impeccable team spirit that delivered our first win in Hungary.

“Fernando has impressed us all since he returned to the sport at the beginning of this year. His dedication, teamwork and focus to extract the maximum from the team is incredible to be a part of and certainly special to witness.

“His performance in Hungary was another example of his racing pedigree and reminded everyone how skilled a driver he is.”

Rossi believes Alonso’s experience will be invaluable to Alpine as the team looks to take a step forward in performance and move further up the grid in 2022.

“I am convinced we can benefit strongly from Fernando’s insight and experience as we enter the final development and optimisation phase of the 2022 chassis and power unit,” he added.

“He is just as hungry as we are for success and is putting in every effort to translate it to performance.

“For now, however, we need to focus on delivering a strong second half of the year, extract the maximum at every race and ensure we finish as high up in the constructors’ standings as possible.

“This will put us in a golden position for next year and the significant opportunity it brings.”

Alonso won the World Endurance Championship crown and took two victories at the Le Mans 24 Hours during his 24-month hiatus from F1, though his quest to become just the second driver in history to win motorsport’s triple crown is only lacking one achievement - success at the Indianapolis 500.

Despite leading on his debut in 2017, Alonso’s chances of a sensational rookie win were ended by a engine failure in the closing stages. Alonso failed to qualify for the race on his return to the Brickyard with McLaren in 2019, before he finished a lowly 21st after being hampered by clutch issues throughout the 2020 edition.

While his dedication is currently laser-focused on F1, Alonso insists he won’t give up on his dream of winning the triple crown and has not ruled out a fourth attempt in the future.

“I think right now my main focus and my full dedication is to the F1 project, especially with the new rules and all the work that we will have to do into next year,” he said.

“In the future we will see but at the moment, I am enjoying myself in this comeback.

“I think I am performing now to a level that I am happy with from Baku and Silverstone, Hungary, so I hope to show and to prove a little bit more in the second half of the season and into next year.

“The future, I will see if there is still a link to F1 or if I will try different things. For sure from all the challenges that I attempt outside of F1, Indy is still not completed so it will be always in the list of wishes.

“But at the moment my full dedication is to F1.”