Fernando Alonso has become the center of attention this season. Coming out of retirement at the age of 38 and getting better with time, he has defied all expectations. Now, he is nearing 42 and still manages to be on the podium almost every race weekend. But the other drivers do have fun poking him for his age. Lewis Hamilton did it after the Canadian GP, and now an F1 prodigy has joined the fun too.

In the Canadian GP, Hamilton, starting on P3, got a better start and overtook Alonso, in P2 before turn 1. When asked about it after the race, Hamilton said that that was possible because “His (Alonso’s) reactions are a little bit slow because he’s a bit older now”. In a press conference before the Austrian GP, even Zhou Guanyu made fun of Alonso. He managed to hilariously include his name even when he was not a part of the question.

The Chinese racer was seen at the Paris Fashion Week last week at the DIOR Men Summer 2024 Show. Referring to that, the interviewer asked him about his presence there and if he intends to pursue a career in fashion. Commenting on the show, he said, “Yeah, had an enjoyable time over there.” Talking about having his own label, Guanyu said, “That’s in the plan of maybe when I’m retiring or around Fernando’s age maybe.”

But instead of being offended, Alonso was amused and even laughed at the comment, along with everybody in the room. Zhou even spoke about his mother being a fashion designer and how he would love to follow in her footsteps. And the idea of creating something and wearing it does fascinate him.

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The chatter goes on but Alonso looks comfortable with everything that’s going on around him. However, one thing that he seems to have a problem with is the Sprint format. On the same tangent, showcasing his years of experience, Fernando cited an old-school solution for the confusing qualifying & weekend format on sprint weekends.

Fernando Alonso Urges F1 to Bring Back Old-School Qualifying

The 2-time champion has been vocal about how only one Free practice is not enough. Teams can have trouble understanding how the care behaves on the circuit. He also gave an alternative of going back to how Qualifying was done in 2003. Even Carlos Sainz seconded him on switching to the older format.

The One-lap qualifying was done over 2 days. And at a time, only one driver would be on the circuit on his flying lap. The same thing was repeated the next morning, with the drivers going out on the track in reverse order. This way, there was consistent track action and smaller teams got more TV exposure. Alonso is the only active driver who has raced in that format.

If Alonso gets his wish fulfilled or not remains to be seen. But for now, the qualifying and sprint format will stay, if not change more. And as for people making fun of him for his age, his performances on the racetrack do the talking.

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