Fernando Alonso Highlights What Went Wrong for Him and Team Last Year

Fernando Alonso will make his third attempt at the Indy 500 and his attempt to win the Triple Crown. This year, he has partnered McLaren as part of a three-car team.

During his previous attempts, Alonso retired from the race after he was in a good position. In the second attempt, he failed to qualify for the Indianapolis 500 in his McLaren-backed Carlin entry.

There were a number of factors that went wrong for the Spaniard in qualifying that year. Murphy’s Law struck the team hard, from an incorrect paint job to a practice crash, Alonso ended up missing out on qualifying.

Unlike last time, Fernando Alonso has been recruited into a three-car team with McLaren for the Indianapolis 500. In 2019, his team ran a single car entry, which he now believes was a mistake.

Alongside the 2-time F1 champion are full-time drivers, Patricio O’Ward and Oliver Askew. Alonso admitted to Autosport that running a single car was a big mistake last year.

He cited that the McLaren-backed Carlin had a couple of issues and performed poorly in the first couple of tests. In addition to that, since there was just one car, the information was sorely lacking.

He admitted, “This year with three cars, even if you have a bad day, you’re still learning a lot of things from the other two cars.”

“So I think that will be a good advantage, plus the team is not new, [Arrow Schmidt Peterson] has been racing for many, many years in IndyCar, and the background and all the knowledge I think is going to be very beneficial with the things that McLaren can add to that project.”

Why did Fernando Alonso rejoin McLaren?

The veteran Spaniard cited loyalty to McLaren as an influential factor behind his decision. Up until then, he was locked in negotiations with Andretti Autosport to race with them. Unfortunately for him, Honda firmly insisted that they would not associate themselves with Alonso.

Alonso admitted that McLaren helped him a lot in the last five years. Now, his target will be to win the Indianapolis 500 and become the second driver in history to bag the Triple Crown, which includes F1’s Monaco GP and the 24 Hours of Le Mans.