Alonso’s weekend on American soil already started to get complicated on Saturday morning when the French team decided to replace the internal combustion engine (ICE) of its A522, which led to a penalty of five positions for the starting grid of Sunday’s race at the 2022 F1 United States GP.
This caused that despite reaching Q3 and being the ninth fastest driver, a great result considering that Esteban Ocon, his teammate, had fallen in Q1 despite having the latest Alpine floor specification, he would start from fourteenth position in Austin.
However, this setback was not a big problem for Fernando Alonso who, before reaching the halfway point of the United States Grand Prix, was already placed in the points zone. After a safety car that regrouped the peloton, the Spaniard reached eighth position and on the back straight of the Circuit of the Americas he tried to overtake Lance Stroll for seventh place.
At the moment of overtaking, both pilots moved practically in unison, one to attack inland and the other to defend the position, also inland. That caused both cars to collide with each other and lead to a hair-raising accident.
Alonso’s Alpine went flying through the air , before landing on the asphalt and impacting directly against the protections of the track, a few seconds in which the Asturian did not know what was happening, since he only saw the sky and he was a passenger of destiny.
Video: the radio conversation between Alonso and Alpine after the Austin accident
Immediately, from the team’s pit wall they worried about their driver and established a small conversation over the radio that showed Alonso’s state of shock , a sequence that DAZN F1 brought to light after the event.
Pit wall: “Are you okay?”
Alonso: “*Heavy breath* Yeah man. A very late move. *More breaths*”
Wall: “How’s the car?”
Alonso: “Ehhh… I have to turn more to the left than to the right”
Listening to the voice and expressions of the man from Oviedo after the incident, it is clear that at that moment he had been afraid and that he feared the worst, as he acknowledged in his post-race statements, where he also stated that he expected to have to leave.
