Fernando Alonso Gets a Fresh Boost of Hope for His 3rd WDC From Aston Martin’s Mastermind: “Don’t Want to Be Any Less…”

Aston Martin consistently beating the likes of Ferrari and Mercedes in 2023 is nothing short of a surprise for F1 fans. Given how much the team struggled to cope with the ground-effect regulations last year, nobody expected them to be that good. But the vision Lawrence Stroll has for them is to be nowhere but the top. The man who holds the same mentality is Fernando Alonso and until now, it is turning out to be a match made in heaven. However, the Spaniard looks nowhere close to challenging the might of the Red Bull drivers as of now. That could change next year given Aston Martin’s aggressive plans that will hit the ground running soon.

It would not be an understatement to say that Aston Martin was in shambles in 2022. Sebastian Vettel arrived with a vision to be on the summit again but realized it was a distant dream. That was perhaps the reason why he quit. Little did he know what the team had in the pipeline, which Alonso would end up taking full advantage of.

Fernando Alonso set to climb to the top next year?

Until now, Alonso has bagged 4 podium finishes from 5 races. On all four of those occasions, the Asturian has taken the P3 spot. Knowing how competitive he is, that is not the spot he would want to stay at forever. Excellence is what he demands and Aston Martin is ready to deliver that to him in 2024.

Racefans recently quoted Aston Martin Technical Director Dan Fallows as saying, “We definitely want to start next’s year car as early as we possibly can. The game really for us is to make sure that we don’t sacrifice this year’s car.”

“Inevitably it will be a form of evolution of this year’s car. So everything we can do to get data, to get updates on this year’s car will certainly inform it. But yes, we will be looking to start as early as possible.”

He also said that they “don’t want to be any less aggressive with the way we go about developing this car than we were going into this year.”

Read More: Charles Leclerc Given a Crucial Advice for His Championship Goals After Costly Miami GP Error: “When You See These Mistakes”

It really is astonishing to see that a team that has stayed in the mid-table since its arrival in F1 makes leaps of progress in just one year while a team like Mercedes that enjoyed undisputed success for 8 years stands stagnant. However, team boss Mike Krack believes that while the feeling is overwhelming, the team won’t let it get to their head.

Mike Krack not taking podium finishes for granted

The AMR23’s pace caught everyone by surprise the moment it hit the tarmac in testing in Bahrain. Surely it was good news for Alonso fans but many believed that teams like Mercedes and Ferrari were ‘sandbagging’. It wasn’t until the Spaniard heroically overtook Lewis Hamilton and Carlos Sainz in the most sublime fashion to take P3 in Bahrain that the reality started to settle in. Since then, the 2-time champion has made podium finishes look like a cakewalk. But that is not a feeling Mike Krack wants to sink in into his team’s mentality.

Motorsport quoted him as saying, “Feet on the ground, you should never take a podium in F1 as normal or as a given.”

“It’s a lot of hard work involved to be on the podium and you have very, very strong competitors in Formula 1, very professional,” he added. “And if we are not 100% in all areas at all times, then there is no podium.”

Watch This Story: Does Fernando Alonso Believe He Can Be a 3-time World Champion?

Do you think the Silverstone-based team is being too ambitious with its future prospects? Or are they really ready to end Red Bull’s juggernaut, which currently looks to be in no mood to stop?