Fernando Alonso was left ruing Renault's lack of pace as the Régie languished woefully behind the front-runners in the Bahrain Grand Prix – but Renault's telemetry did clear him of any allegations of ‘brake-testing' in his coming-together with Lewis Hamilton.
Forced to contend with a damaged rear wing resulting from the incident, Alonso went on to finish the race in a lowly tenth place, almost a lap down on the two Ferraris and narrowly fending off Honda's Rubens Barrichello to the chequered flag. What's more, only the Super Aguri and Scuderia Toro Rosso cars proved slower in terms of quickest lap times in Sakhir, with even former team-mate Giancarlo Fisichella's Force India a tenth up on Alonso's best effort.
“To be the eighth-quickest out of eleven teams is too far back,” the double world champion admitted to Spanish newspaper Marca. “No longer are only Ferrari, McLaren and BMW ahead. Now also in front of us are Toyota, Williams, Red Bull [and] Honda.”
The French concern is pinning its hopes on a new aerodynamic package – set to be introduced for Alonso's home race in Barcelona in three weeks' time – but even with the addition of that, he argued, podiums are likely to remain little more than a pipe dream in 2008.
“We will see how much [the aero upgrade] can improve the car and how much they [Renault's rivals] also improve,” he stressed. “It is the only hope we can hold on to – and we need something. If it doesn't happen, it will be worrying.
“[Finishing up on the podium] is impossible, because we would need to gain a second and that just isn't there – that level of improvement doesn't exist.
“That isn't what we are looking for, though. What we are looking for now is to be level with Toyota for example, to enter Q2 and Q3 and work our way up to race the big three – Ferrari, McLaren and BMW.”
Crash.net
Forced to contend with a damaged rear wing resulting from the incident, Alonso went on to finish the race in a lowly tenth place, almost a lap down on the two Ferraris and narrowly fending off Honda's Rubens Barrichello to the chequered flag. What's more, only the Super Aguri and Scuderia Toro Rosso cars proved slower in terms of quickest lap times in Sakhir, with even former team-mate Giancarlo Fisichella's Force India a tenth up on Alonso's best effort.
“To be the eighth-quickest out of eleven teams is too far back,” the double world champion admitted to Spanish newspaper Marca. “No longer are only Ferrari, McLaren and BMW ahead. Now also in front of us are Toyota, Williams, Red Bull [and] Honda.”
The French concern is pinning its hopes on a new aerodynamic package – set to be introduced for Alonso's home race in Barcelona in three weeks' time – but even with the addition of that, he argued, podiums are likely to remain little more than a pipe dream in 2008.
“We will see how much [the aero upgrade] can improve the car and how much they [Renault's rivals] also improve,” he stressed. “It is the only hope we can hold on to – and we need something. If it doesn't happen, it will be worrying.
“[Finishing up on the podium] is impossible, because we would need to gain a second and that just isn't there – that level of improvement doesn't exist.
“That isn't what we are looking for, though. What we are looking for now is to be level with Toyota for example, to enter Q2 and Q3 and work our way up to race the big three – Ferrari, McLaren and BMW.”
Crash.net