On Saturday, Alonso shone in the wet, qualifying second in Canada, but on Sunday he crossed the line in seventh behind teammate Ocon .
In addition, he would later drop another two places when he received a time penalty for his defense against Valtteri Bottas, and leaves Montreal with two points in the locker, one from a license penalty and a ninth place.
Alpine director Otmar Szafnauer believes that had Alonso not been affected by the engine problem that caused him to lose straightline speed for some 50 laps, he could have battled with Lewis Hamilton and George Russell for a podium place.
Alonso was also affected when making his first green flag pit stop, since just when he was going to do it during a Virtual Safety Car that his rivals did take advantage of, the race was neutralized again.
In the latter part of the race Alonso found himself trailing Esteban Ocon who helped him have DRS to stay ahead of Bottas ‘ Alfa Romeo. And although Alonso managed it, the stewards summoned him (and then sanctioned) for zigzagging in front of the Finn on a straight.
“These are good points, but without the safety cars I think it could have been a bit better,” said Szafnauer. “The pace of the car in the wet was good. The pace of the car in the dry, I think we would not be as fast as the Ferraris and the Red Bulls, but as fast as the Mercedes.”
“And in the end the Mercedes beat us due to sheer circumstances. However, in the championship we are not going to overtake them, we are not going to finish third.”
“So regarding the teams we are fighting for fourth place, I am very happy, we have scored a lot of points.”
Asked about Alonso’s power unit problem, Szafnauer said: “We had a little problem with Fernando’s car, so he finished behind Esteban.
“We still don’t know exactly what it is. But it looks like it was an air leak somewhere in the engine, but I still don’t know from where.”
“That translated into higher temperatures, and then we had to manage, and that’s why we were limited on the straight. Thank God it wasn’t so big that we retired.”
After the race, Alonso lamented that team problems always seem to affect his car, but Szafnauer played his words down.
“I’m not sure it always happens to him,” he said. “I’m sure it feels like that, but I’m not sure it is.”
Szafnauer said the team did not have a firm explanation for why Alonso was so quick in qualifying in the wet, but he wants to understand.
“Even with all the computers we have, which we have a lot of, we are still trying to understand the differences,” he said. “But part of the reason is that he was very good in the wet, and he had a good lap time. He was also fast on Friday, we had good pace in long runs as well.”
“A lot of that is down to the circumstances, whether the track is drying out and whether the others are at the same time. So there are a lot of variables to look at and understand.”
