Fernando Alonso making most out of his season despite McLaren’s woes

Associated PressMay 10, 2018, 7:02 PM EDT
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BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Fernando Alonso doesn’t hide the fact he expected more from McLaren by now.

Still, he arrives for his home race in Spain happy with what he and the team have achieved so far.

“Definitely we are not in the position we wanted or expected at the beginning of the winter,” Alonso said ahead of this weekend’s Spanish Grand Prix. “At the same time, I think it has been a very positive start to the season. We are the only team completing the full four races with both cars. We did score points in every single race and we are fourth in the constructors’ championship.”

Alonso finished in the points in all four races and is sixth in the drivers’ standings, ahead even of Max Verstappen of Red Bull. Alonso started with a fifth place in Australia and was seventh in each of the next three races – Bahrain, China and Azerbaijan.

But that still doesn’t quite meet the high expectations McLaren faced after it made the switch from the troubled Honda engine to Renault. There were even talks about the team being able to challenge title-contenders Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull.

Yet the year began with McLaren not as close to the front-runners as it had hoped for, and it found itself in the middle of the pack fighting with several other teams just to be the best of the rest.

The car was not as fast as expected, especially in qualifying, and its top speeds were among the slowest on the grid.

“Still a long way to go for us, but at the same time we were here last year with zero points,” two-time world champion Alonso said. “So it has been a very good start, in a way. Let’s keep the momentum.”

Alonso’s teammate Stoffel Vandoorne is 14th in the drivers’ standings after scoring points in three of the first four races.

This weekend will mark the fifth anniversary of Alonso’s last F1 victory, which came in Barcelona with Ferrari. He said he has kept his motivation throughout the winning drought and had some of his best races in the series despite not being able to win.

” I did some better races in the last five years, even if the last victory was five years ago,” Alonso said. “I will never probably do a race as I did in Baku, and I finished seventh. It’s difficult to see from the outside but extremely proud and motivated every time you do a one-off performance.”

Alonso started 13th in Azerbaijan and dropped to the back of the pack after another car collided with him on the first lap. He barely made it back to the pits, arriving practically on two wheels, but gradually made his way back to the front to finish on the points for a fourth straight race.

Alonso is coming off a victory in the 6 Hours of Spa in the World Endurance Championship.

“Definitely felt good. It felt a long time not being on the podium and it has been a good preparation,” said Alonso, who will also compete in next month’s 24 Hours of Le Mans, where he said victory would mean more than a home triumph this weekend.

“Now that I have won a couple of times here in Spain, obviously for me it would be (more meaningful) winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans, because it’s the biggest race in the world,” he said.

Alonso said his results in the endurance championship would not directly affect his decisions about his future in F1, although he did say he wasn’t happy with the predictability of F1 these days.

“The biggest thing here is how predictable everything is,” he said. “We can put on a paper now what will be the qualifying here on Saturday, what will be in Monaco, in Canada and in Silverstone, so that’s something you need to take into account for future decisions. This is sad, in a way, for Formula 1, the direction in which everything went.”

 

Ford unveils a new Mustang for 2024 Le Mans in motorsports ‘lifestyle brand’ retooling

Associated PressJun 9, 2023, 7:00 PM EDT
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LE MANS, France — Ford has planned a return to the 24 Hours of Le Mans with its iconic Mustang muscle car next year under a massive rebranding of Ford Performance aimed at bringing the automotive manufacturer “into the racing business.”

The Friday unveil of the new Mustang Dark Horse-based race car follows Ford’s announcement in February (and a ballyhooed test at Sebring in March) that it will return to Formula One in 2026 in partnership with reigning world champion Red Bull.

The Mustang will enter the GT3 category next year with at least two cars in both IMSA and the World Endurance Championship, and is hopeful to earn an invitation to next year’s 24 Hours of Le Mans. The IMSA entries will be a factory Ford Performance program run by Multimatic, and a customer program in WEC with Proton Competition.

Ford CEO Jim Farley, also an amateur sports car racer, told The Associated Press the Mustang will be available to compete in various GT3 series across the globe to customer teams. But more important, Farley said, is the overall rebranding of Ford Performance – done by renowned motorsports designer Troy Lee – that is aimed at making Ford a lifestyle brand with a sporting mindset.

“It’s kind of like the company finding its own, and rediscovering its icons, and doubling down on them,” Farley told the AP. “And then this motorsports activity is getting serious about connecting enthusiast customers with those rediscovered icons. It’s a big switch for the company – this is really about building strong, iconic vehicles with enthusiasts at the center of our marketing.”

Ford last competed in sports car racing in 2019 as part of a three-year program with Chip Ganassi Racing. The team scored the class win at Le Mans in 2016 in a targeted performance aimed to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Ford snapping Ferrari’s six-year winning streak.

Ford on Friday displayed a Mustang with a Lee-designed livery that showcased the cleaner, simplified look that will soon be featured on all its racing vehicles. The traditional blue oval with Ford Performance in white lettering underneath will now be branded simply FP.

The new mark will be used across car liveries, merchandise and apparel, display assets, parts and accessories and in advertising.

Farley cited Porsche as an automaker that has successfully figured out how to sell cars to consumers and race cars in various series around the world while creating a culture of brand enthusiasts. He believes Ford’s new direction will help the company sell street cars, race cars, boost interest in driving schools, and create a merchandise line that convinces consumers that a stalwart of American automakers is a hip, cool brand.

“We’re going to build a global motorsports business off road and on road,” Farley told the AP, adding that the design of the Mustang is “unapologetically American.”

He lauded the work of Lee, who is considered the top helmet designer among race car drivers.

“We’re in the first inning of a nine inning game, and going to Le Mans is really important,” Farley said. “But for customer cars, getting the graphics right, designing race cars that win at all different levels, and then designing a racing brand for Ford Performance that gets rebranded and elevated is super important.”

He said he’s kept a close eye on how Porsche and Aston Martin have built their motorsports businesses and said Ford will be better.

“We’re going in the exact same direction. We just want to be better than them, that’s all,” Farley said. “Second is the first loser.”

Farley, an avid amateur racer himself, did not travel to Le Mans for the announcement. The race that begins Saturday features an entry from NASCAR, and Ford is the reigning Cup Series champion with Joey Logano and Team Penske.

The NASCAR “Garage 56” entry is a collaboration between Hendrick Motorsports, Chevrolet and Goodyear, and is being widely celebrated throughout the industry. Farley did feel left out of the party in France – a sentiment NASCAR tried to avoid by inviting many of its partners to attend the race so that it wouldn’t seem like a Chevrolet-only celebration.

“They’re going right and I’m going left – that NASCAR thing is a one-year deal, right? It’s Garage 56 and they can have their NASCAR party, but that’s a one-year party,” Farley said. “We won Le Mans outright four times, we won in the GT class, and we’re coming back with Mustang and it’s not a one-year deal.

“So they can get all excited about Garage 56. I almost see that as a marketing exercise for NASCAR, but for me, that’s a science project,” Farley continued. “I don’t live in a world of science projects. I live in the world of building a vital company that everyone is excited about. To do that, we’re not going to do a Garage 56 – I’ve got to beat Porsche and Aston Martin and Ferrari year after year after year.”

Ford’s announcement comes on the heels of General Motors changing its GT3 strategy next season and ending its factory Corvette program. GM, which unlike Ford competes in the IMSA Grand Touring Prototype division (with its Cadillac brand), will shift fully to a customer model for Corvettes in 2024 (with some factory support in the IMSA GTD Pro category).