Fernando Alonso battled to perhaps one of the hardest fought podiums of his career, after passing Sergio Pérez on the last lap of the São Paulo Grand Prix.
The Aston Martin driver fumbled his first start from fourth place on the grid, but thanks to the big crash between Alexander Albon and Kevin Magnussen he got a mulligan. He capitalised on a good restart with a decisive move on Lewis Hamilton into the Descida do Lago turn at the end of the straight.
A decent strategy kept him in third place right until the end, but after the second round of pitstops, with some 20-odd laps to go, Checo got within reach of the Spaniard.
Alonso used every trick in the book to keep the Mexican behind, maximising his exit out of turn 12 to keep the Red Bull driver as far away as possible, but in the penultimate lap Pérez managed to pass him into the first turn.
A lap later he forced Pérez to compromise his exit onto the straight down to turn 4, giving Alonso the opportunity to retake third place, much to the delight of the fans. The battle would be determined with a drag race to the line, with Alonso coming out on top with just 0.053 seconds between the two. It was a tough battle according to the 42 year old veteran.
“For me it was like 30 laps that I had the pressure from Checo. But yeah, when he passed me two laps to the end, I thought, ‘OK, this is gone, the podium is not possible anymore,'” he explained the last few laps.
“But he braked a little bit late into 1 and I said, ‘OK, I go for it into 4.’ And yeah, this is a phenomenal result for the team.”
TV footage of the battle showed Alonso deliberately missing the apex at turn 12 to set the car up for the best possible exit heading for the long run to turn 1.
Alonso explained his tactics of taking different lines and his use of the battery as the Mexican harried him.
“Being the car in front, you have a little bit of an advantage in terms of grip in the last three corners. So I was just making sure… Not making any mistake in those three corners, because if not, Checo will be too close.
“I was using the energy also in the straights just to make sure that there was no opportunity for Checo.
“And yeah, in the lines, we were just changing lines sometimes. I didn’t want to be always on the same line, if possible, like this. If he goes on the inside, I was from time to time on the inside from time to time on the outside.”
“So it was not a clear direction for him to really change the racing line and take the opportunity for some clean air. So I was just trying to get some turbulence to his front nose.”
The Silverstone-based team has suffered from poor form the last few races, after a series of updates were introduced. So this result couldn’t come at a better time.
“We’ve been struggling for a couple of months already, especially the last two events with two retirements, so this podium is for them, for everyone in the factory. And yeah, we keep fighting till the last lap.”
The two-time world champion was relieved that the updates introduced a while back finally start to deliver.
“I think we’re still learning about the car. You know, these cars are so complex aerodynamically.
“So yeah, we we’ve been experimenting a little bit to find the direction for next year without forgetting this year that we are still competing. So happy for the result.
“And now to Vegas.”
