Fernando Alonso is refusing to give up on a points finish in Sunday’s Malaysian Grand Prix despite being resigned to last place on the grid after a power unit penalty.
McLaren driver Alonso arrived in Malaysia armed with an updated Honda power unit, but was forced to take new components and trigger a penalty so it could be fitted to his car.
As a result, the Spaniard entered qualifying with a 45-place grid drop looming over his head, meaning he would start last regardless of where he finished in Saturday’s session.
Alonso opted to set a time good enough to qualify before returning to the pits to save his tire and car life, ultimately being classified P22.
“In practice yesterday, we were comfortably inside the top 10, so there’s an element of frustration to find ourselves with useful performance, but facing a grid penalty ahead of the race,” Alonso admitted.
“Hopefully, we’ve now stockpiled enough components for the remainder of the season that we no longer need to take grid penalties and start at the back.
“My running in FP3 this morning was particularly important – our aim was to conduct some long runs and gain some useful data for the race. In qualifying, we just ran for a few laps, with the aim to save as many sets of tires for the race as we could.”
Despite starting last, Alonso remains optimistic of a points finish in Malaysia after an impressive display in Singapore two weeks ago, where he finished seventh.
“It’ll be interesting tomorrow to see how well we’re able to read the conditions and play the strategy,” Alonso said.
“The new asphalt keeps improving quickly and, while it’ll be difficult to overtake 12 cars and get into the points, I think there’s still something more to come from us tomorrow.”
Teammate Jenson Button led McLaren’s charge in qualifying, reaching Q3 before finishing ninth in the sister MP4-31 car.
“I really enjoyed qualifying! It’s never nice to be just 0.029s behind the car in front, but that wasn’t too bad – we were either going to be eighth or ninth, and we ended up being ninth. I’m happy with that,” Button said.
“During Q1, I had issues with traffic. I had to out-brake Esteban Ocon into Turn 9 during my quick lap, and you shouldn’t have to be doing that during qualifying. I also had a little spin at Turn 14 when I lost all my downforce behind one of the Renaults. That first session was busy.
“Still, we’ve improved the car a lot since practice yesterday, but the team has done a great job to improve it. Qualifying was the first time this weekend that I really felt comfortable.
“Hopefully we can show well in the race – there’s no reason why we can’t fight the cars around us tomorrow.”
The Malaysian Grand Prix is live on NBCSN and the NBC Sports app from 2am ET on Sunday.