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Fernando Alonso has some fond memories of his single season alongside Lewis Hamilton in 2007.
The duo’s championship scrap at McLaren was billed as a highly tumultuous one, but Spaniard Alonso - now at Ferrari - insists that his only argument was with the British team’s then management led by Ron Dennis.
"If we were teammates at another team it would be a much cleaner struggle, and a real one," said Alonso, who finished the season equal with Hamilton and a single point shy of Kimi Raikkonen’s title.
Recalling 2007, he explained to Spanish sports newspaper Marca: "You always learn lessons in tough times.
"That year was good overall, both Lewis and I learned many things. When you share a team with a top driver you learn to grow together.
"You improve in terms of preparing for a race and even from his driving style, because you share telemetry, so it was a great experience," added Alonso.
As for 2011, Ferrari is now switching its focus to 2012, with Alonso admitting chasing down Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel will be almost impossible.
"Ferrari can not go to races not thinking about winning, but we are realists and know how difficult it is. We need Vettel to have failures," he said.
The Spaniard is therefore much more confident about 2012.
"Of course we can catch them (Red Bull)," insisted Alonso. "The rules have changed, the blown diffusers will be forbidden, so the philosophy in the development and in the wind tunnel has to change."
He said Ferrari’s recent structural changes have already made a difference.
"I have noticed more desire and general optimism, more speed in decision-making, more courage in the development. Yes, we have improved the structure and how we work."
Source: Nextgen
I have just arrived in Valencia today, Wednesday, after spending a week at home in Sao Paolo following on from the Canadian Grand Prix that had promised so much but did not deliver the result I was capable of getting. But in a busy Formula 1 season like this one, you don’t have long to wait to try again and that is what I plan to do this weekend. The Valencia street circuit has good memories for me, because I had a great start here, winning the very first race held in 2008, having started from pole position. I missed the 2009 event of course and then I was competitive again last year, having a good race until the well documented incident with the Safety Car. So there are plenty of reasons to expect we can have another strong weekend this year and in the very hot conditions predicted for the next few days, the 150º Italia should get the tyres to work well too.
One of the criticisms of this street circuit was that it turned out to be very difficult to overtake other cars, but this year we have the Downforce Reduction System and, like in Canada, we have two DRS zones where we can operate it. For sure, this will change the characteristics of the race, making it much easier to overtake. However, you have to do everything you can to ensure your car is competitive throughout the whole race, because this is the direction we have seen things go this year, in that if you are not competitive then it is very easy to lose places to other cars. In the past, before DRS, even if your car was slower than the one behind, you could defend your position more easily, keeping the car behind and not getting passed.
Another interesting factor will be our tyre choice here, because for the first time this season we will be running Pirelli’s Medium compound tyre as the Prime, with the Soft, that we know well by now, as the Option. I drove with the Medium in winter testing, but it was much colder then, which means it behaved very differently and a couple of weeks ago, in Montreal, we were given the opportunity to evaluate it quickly during free practice, but the Canadian track surface is very different to the one in Valencia. If I had to sum up the new tyre, I would say it is very much like the original Hard tyre we had from Pirelli earlier this season. After a few races, they changed it, making it harder still and this Medium feels like the original Hard. The Ferrari engineers have been working intensely on adapting the car to suit the tyres, as we have struggled more with the harder end of the compound range and we will test again a modified suspension to try and make it more suited to them.
We are heading for a very busy part of the season, with a run of four races in five weeks and although Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro has been competitive in the last couple of races, we will soon be heading to Silverstone which is more likely to suit our rivals who have gone better on tracks that require more aerodynamic downforce. However, we have definitely made progress in this area since the last time we were in Spain, at the Barcelona circuit and it will be interesting to see where we stand this weekend: even if Valencia is a street track, sitting somewhere between Monaco and Canada in terms of its characteristics, it still has a final high speed sector which will be an interesting indication of how much progress we have made on our car and we will get the first indications on Friday, in free practice. Source: Ferrari.com
I arrived at Suzuka yesterday in the late afternoon and I received a surprise straightaway. The traditional Italian restaurant “Campanella”, that is popular with many Formula 1 people, doesn’t exist any more. That’s a pity because I’ve been going there since the first time I came to Suzuka at the end of the Nineties when I raced here in karts. I was in the same hotel that I am now and so many good memories of this circuit are linked directly to that first experience. Sure, there was also the success in 2006 which was crucial for my second world championship. I well know that race probably calls something unpleasant to mind for many people both inside and outside Ferrari but that’s racing: to win on this track gives a special emotion because it’s one of the hardest tracks in the world. To succeed here you need to have a car that is very strong from the aerodynamic point of view: in some ways it’s similar to Silverstone and to Barcelona. There’s a very special first section characterised by a very long first bend and a series of Esses that can have a major influence on the lap time if you don’t get them absolutely right. It’s a track that’s very demanding both on the technical side and when it comes to driving.
As I’ve already said in recent days, the F10 has proved it is competitive at very different tracks such as Monza and Singapore so there is no obvious reason why it shouldn’t be the same in Suzuka. But to start understanding where we really are, we will have to wait until Friday afternoon after we’ve gone through the first two sessions of free practice. I like Japan, it’s one of my favourite countries. I like it for the food and for the culture, both so different from our European traditions. And then there’s Tokyo, a very beautiful city that is always very interesting. To race at Suzuka is special also for the enthusiasm of the Japanese fans who are truly passionate. We hope to offer them a good show this weekend. Source: Alonso's Blog - Ferrari.com
