China as well. The botched start and inability to regain 1st position forced Red Bull to employ too risky 2-stop strategy.

When you start nitpicking at Vettel's performances like this it shows that he couldn't have done much better...

not logical , but okay.

he threw away some race wins in the most dominant car (or one of the most dominant cars) in the history of this sport, and thats why alonsos performance in his not competitive car was far more impressive.

Alonso had a stunning season but to call it the greatest of all time is ridiculous at best.

Also you believe that Vettel threw race wins away at the Nurburgring and the Hungaroring when it was not the case. At the Nurburgring the Red Bull clearly wasn't the best car and if we are going to hold Vettel to such high standards at the Hungaroring then it could be said that Alonso also threw away a race win with his horrible start, his excursion off the track while on Button's tail early in the race. Hell he even spun when he was hunting Vettel down later in the race.

i called it the greatest under the given circumstances, and how alonso fought like a lion in a not competitive car against drivers in much stronger cars till the end for the second place in the championship.

about vettel: i didnt come up with him, but as someone came up with it, i articulated, why i think alonsos 2011 season was more impressive than vettels.

about you calling it ridiculous: who gives a damn

Yes agreed. It's not even an opinion as far I am concerned. Calling it the greatest of all time is like saying you are not in touch with reality.

The article claims that the girl posted the pics on Facebook so I guess someone took them from there.

First day of testing, let's hope everything works great and at the end of the day he gives the team postive feedback.

How long do you think the history of this sport stretches back to? 3 years? 4 years? Or 5 years?

Interesting passing comment by Bouillier on FA:



How political is he actually?

How could Boullier know? He never worked with Alonso - hey, he even wasn't part of the F1 world before he took over Renault! By that time Alonso had already left the team, and Boullier was trying to make sure that all the blame on the Singapore scandal was removed from what was left of the team and placed solely on those who left - none of whom he had worked with.

Now, if you read the whole article he attacks Alonso to justify why he (Boullier) fired Grosjean when he took over Renault (Grosjean "did not perform" and was "destroyed" after his stance at Renault) and hence to justify why it is a good move for him, Boullier, to bring Grosjean back now. Interestingly, his comments are quite different to what Grosjean himself, or even Piquet Sr, said about his relationship with Alonso. But hey, we are sure that Boullier knows better despite never having been around the Renault box at that time ;)

http://www.thenational.ae/sport/motorsport...-grosjean#page2
"Grosjean enjoys a close relationship with Alonso: the pair live nearby in Switzerland and catch up whenever they have the opportunity away from race weekends.
And Grosjean was quick to praise the Spaniard for his role in easing him into the team. He said: "He is a great champion - maybe the best driver in Formula One and it's a great opportunity for me to work with him for the rest of the season. We get on well and we meet up when we're both free and he says I can ask him anything if I have any questions or need advice."

By the way, I need to confirm this point but I have read on BBC Sport that Grosjean is now managed by Boullier. D'Ambrosio was managed by Boullier too when he got the role of third driver at Renault in 2010. Now which other Renault manager had the tendency to give driving seats to the guys he managed?

To me Boullier simply seems to have joined the wagon of those blaming Alonso for everything under the sun... while trying to present himself in the nicest light possible. But I don't buy it ;)

It's not interesting, Buillier for some reason has always hated or disliked Alonso, he is using his feelings toward Alonso to make Kimi (his main driver) look good, not that he need it anyway.

Well, Boullier wouldn't know the answer any better than you or me, because during Alonsos times at Renault he had as much connection to the team as you or me.

Who is Boullier para hablar de Alonso?

I hope Alonso is very political!

Why?
Because for me the word political isnt per se a negatvie word.
political means: "Politics (from Greek πολιτικός, "of, for, or relating to citizens") is a process by which groups of people make collective decisions."
look here for example.

And yes Alonso is a very social person (not an egoist who exludes himself from collective decision making processes) who likes to take part in collective decision making processes.

Fernando today in Jerez.

High Res--> http://www.formula1.com/wi/sutton/2011/dcd1209fe35.jpg

Some pics from today.




more.

This is better than his usual "ugly" cap.

Boullier doesn't need to work with Alonso to know if he's political or not. He might not have been part of the F1 world, but he had closer links to it than you and me.



That is not what Boullier meant by 'political'. And I agree that it's not necessarily negative, but nowadays it's not really seen as something positive.



This is by far the worst...

To enforce to those that don't want them.

Boullier is really annoying. He always uses Alonso to talk up his new driver. He did it whith Kubica and is doing it again with Kimi.
He should wash his mouth before talking about Alonso, one of the men responsible of winning 4 WC for that team, which will be probably 4 more than he´ll achieve when he finishes his contract with Renault.

POST OF THE YEAR!!

In other words, he judges a person through hearsay instead of getting to know said person and forming an independent opinion.



If I use the same stick of measurement ( Interviews, articles and hearsey etc) on Boullier and judge his actions - he seems like the successor of a B(riat)ore .

Speak for yourself Seriously though, I do happen to have some friends who have been first-hand involved with F1, and known Alonso, for a much longer time that Boullier has. But no, they have not given me the answers to all the big questions we have about what has been happening in F1 over the last few years, despite my attempts to extract that information from them.

But in any case, Boullier having closer links to F1 than you and me still means zilch when it comes to giving him any credibility when he talks about how Renault F1 used to work prior to Genii taking over - he was not there, and if he were honest he should start his comments with "I have heard that..." or "I understand from what other people have told me..." rather than portraying himself as having some type of first-hand inside knowledge.

The Red Bull was the best car but there have been more dominating cars, there's no proof whatsoever that Alonso drove better than Vettel, both did well in the cars they were given

To make things short, what I want to say is that some people can just see through things. It's not (all) about inside knowledge etc. You don't have to be there to know what's going on. I'm not saying Boullier is right or wrong btw. Apart from that, comments can be misleading sometimes.

Ask Ron Dennis.

a bit unfortunate
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/...scort-site.html

I have great respect for RD, one of the faces of f1, but he has made himself believe so much his own party prop line that McLaren always gives its drivers equality that I don't consider him anywhere near unbiased in this matter.

Nobody cares about his girlfriend or his private life, the ones that care go to the right places to read that kind of info, please avoid posting this kind of things here, thank you

why ask a dictator about a collective decision making process

There are some who do care about that, this is only your opinion. Anyway, I do agree that what Owen posted doesn't belong here. It's pure crap.

Are you kidding? Everyone up and down the pitlane couldn't fault Vettel, he was the best driver by miles and won more races/poles than Alonso in his WDC years. Alonso may of had a few good races in the Ferrari but you are blind and a true fanboy if you think that Alonso was better than Vettel in 2011. You are free to think Alonso overall is the better driver, but performance wise last season Alonso got owned by Vettel. Vettel blew the barn doors off Webber, and Alonso got outraced and outqualified by Massa too many times.

That is the best laugh of the day, get some obscure race performances (which ones by the way?) and elevate them above Vettel's win/pole/domination of 2011.

Then maybe they are in the wrong place. Forums > Racing Comments > Fernando Alonso Thread



A small video from yesterdays press conference.

http://www.skysports.com/video/clips/0,23791,12602,00.html

edit:

ok I found the press conference, almost 7 minutes but in spanish.

http://youtu.be/mAG3uREr7BE

why is the old thread on again?

anyway:
thx kosmos for the videos

I asked Buttoner to merge it with the new one, the one that originally was Alonso in 2012 and renamed as Fernando Alonso Thread, I think it makes more sense to keep discussing in the old thread, we don't need a new topic every season.

Alonso about to join twitter?

Translation - "Dining with a (near) future twitterer"

https://twitter.com/#!/raqueldlrosario/...2609152/photo/1

Weird

This the best part:

The 30-year-old double world champion was not available for comment today.

Or yesterday. Or tomorrow. Or.... ever (on this kind of stuff).

Donno what's weirder.. that Alonso might join twitter or he's having casual dinner with his ex wife? Is he's fake girlfriend taking the photo, to complete the circle of weirdness?

On a serious note thought Ferrari didn't allow the drivers to join twitter

Ask Massa.

Ah yes, the Sun, ever enhancing the British media's reputation and credentials

Haha, it's all pretty weird to be honest. They were reportedly seen kissing too, didn't look like friends to some.

Anyway, I don't think Ferrari will find it a problem.

http://www.formula1.com/wi/1600x1200/sutto...ms1209fe293.jpg

Awesome pic

Alonso overtake in Jerez.......

Alonso in Ferrari video

What a pain that I can't understand italian.......

Thanks for this, there is some stuff that I never saw. It goes from 4°Vol - 1di5 to 4°Vol - 5di5, basically is the story of Fernando plus the 2010 season review. Alonso winning in Imola 2005 with one less cylinder was so epic.