Alonso speaks out after Aston Martin call ruins chance to beat Verstappen

Fernando Alonso has spoken out about his difficulties in keeping the car on the track in Monaco after Aston Martin’s decision ruined his chances of beating Max Verstappen. The team opted to fit dry tyres instead of intermediates or full wets at a crucial stage which could have changed the outcome of the race.

Verstappen held the lead at the start of the race in the Principality and began pulling away from Alonso’s Aston Martin. The Dutchman held onto a comfortable advantage with the gap maintained at around 10 seconds before a rain shower caused chaos.

Alonso stopped first with Aston Martin bizarrely opting for dry tyres as others took for the intermediates. After the race, Alonso said: “It was difficult and we started on the hard tyres, so gave up the possibility into Turn One.

“We hoped to play the long game with the strategy but Max drove super well on the medium tyres to extend that first stint. We didn’t have any chance then the rain made things a bit complicated out there.”

When asked about the rain, Alonso added: “No full power on the lap, braking was extremely fragile into turn five and 10. It was not easy.

“I was surprised there were no incidents, safety cars. Everyone did an amazing job to keep the cars on the track.” According to Sky Sports F1, Alonso questioned the decision over team radio but his team were adamant the dry compounds were the right call. 

A switch to wet tyres would have given Alonso a chance to close on Verstappen who was struggling around as the conditions quickly worsened. Verstappen also had a big moment at Portier on his lap into the pits, losing control of the rear end and tapping the barrier on the outside.

But, he was safe from being passed as Alonso was forced to stop again a lap later. 

An extra stop dropped the Spaniard around 20 seconds behind with Verstappen cruising to his fourth win of the season. The championship leader extends his advantage over Sergio Perez to 39 points after a difficult weekend for the Mexican. 

Perez finished outside the points after crashing in qualifying and being forced to start at the back of the field. Verstappen commented: “Then it started to rain and we had to make the call to go onto the inters.

“It was incredibly slippery and when you are that far in the lead you don’t want to push to hard but also you don’t want to lose too much time so it’s quite difficult in that scenario. I clipped the wall a few times and it was super difficult out there. But that’s Monaco.”