Why Alonso is “cautious” about Monaco chances despite Alpine’s fast F1 car

The two-time world champion has been outclassed by teammate Esteban Ocon across the opening four races of the 2021 season while he continues to get up to speed at Alpine in his comeback year.

Alpine’s recent progress helped Alonso record his second Q3 appearance of the season at his home grand prix in Barcelona before he faded in the race when a strategy gamble backfired.

While he is confident Alpine will be fast in Monaco, Alonso knows he will need to overcome a weakness that has hampered him so far this campaign if he is to get the most out of the weekend.

"I think the car will be fast in Monaco,” Alonso said. “I feel good about the performance there.

“One of the things that I need to get better for sure is to extract the maximum of the car in one lap, and when you push the car having the confidence of what the car is doing. “I’m not 100% on that at the moment.

“In Monaco, it is crucial that I get the maximum out of the car on Saturday. So I remain a little more cautious because of my own work than my own car.

“Let’s say I feel confident in the car, now I need to work myself to be comfortable on that side as well. It is up to me, so let’s try.”

Alpine made a step forward when it introduced an upgrade package in Portugal and its continued strong performance in Spain gave the French squad a better idea of where it stands relative to its nearest competitors.

“I think we had some good answers on some of the performance of the car and performance of the competitors,” Alonso explained.

“I was more or less comfortable. We have more pace in qualifying than the race. I think the racing was even tighter than qualifying as it seems things were very, very similar on the performance of the other cars.”