Fernando Alonso admitted feeling surprised after his result in qualifying and added that such a positive result gives him even more confidence for the season.
The Spaniard wasn’t so sure to be competitive in the single-lap pace after winter testing, and finding himself in the mix with Ferrari and Mercedes is a “massive surprise”.
“Extremely happy,” he said when asked if he was happy after qualifying. “I think it was a nice surprise to find ourselves competitive in the single-lap pace after winter testing. We are in the mix, we are within one-tenth together with Ferrari, with [Lewis] Hamilton, so it’s a massive surprise.
“I think that [compared to last week] the car was more connected. We had some difficulties last week to feel the car and understand its needs. It was quite inconsistent. I think this weekend, all the setup changes we are trying are doing what we expect.”
Referring to the race, the two-time world champion said that Aston Martin wasn’t perfect in the long run, but he believes it’s going to be a tight race with many drivers close to each other.
“Let’s see, I think we didn’t have perfect long runs in winter testing, and also yesterday we didn’t look particularly good. I think it’s going to be an extremely tight race, and racing in a group of cars is never an easy thing to manage in terms of tires and things like that.”
Alonso also admitted that last year, Aston Martin couldn’t improve the car much and lacked performance in the second part of the season compared to other teams. Therefore, they worked during winter to better understand how to properly develop the car.
“It’s a very good start, a bit unexpected, but we take it. We learned a lot of things last year as a team on how to be a contender for big things and if we want to compete with Ferrari, and Mercedes we need to raise the level of development.
“We started with a good base, but we were stuck there for many races. This year we changed the concept of how to design the car and the upgrades. So, to start strong gives me a lot of optimism for the future.”