The disappointment continues in the Aston Martin camp as Fernando Alonso exits qualifying in Q1 for the second consecutive race after Imola last week.
He only qualified 16th — now P14 following the disqualifications for the Haas drivers — as the margins were very tight during session, with Alonso 0.5s away from P1. His teammate Lance Stroll outqualified him by 0.3 seconds, finishing 9th in Q1.
Alonso supported the idea of using group qualifying like in F2 and F3 to set the grid in Monaco, citing the luck of the draw with traffic around the circuit. He tried to get his final lap in while six different cars were on their cool laps.
In F2 and F3, the field is split into two groups in Monaco. The fastest driver between the two groups takes pole, the fastest in the second group takes second, and it continues to alternate between both groups accordingly, saying: “I think that [group qualifying] will be great.
“I think Monaco is so exciting and so thrilling that it will be nice to see everyone’s lap live, because we miss a lot of great moments. But yeah, it’s the way it is.
“You can get lucky or unlucky. I think last year I got lucky and I made some progress in Q1, Q2 and then in Q3 you are P2 and maybe some of the big contenders that were out of Q1 or out of Q2.
“This time it was for us the bad side of it and Checo as well. I think he’s P18. This is Monaco. You need to find your luck as well and we didn’t do today.”
As they chase more pace, the team brought new updates to their car last week in Imola. However, these upgrades haven’t yielded significant results.
The Spaniard conceded that the car is not where it should be. In practice, Alonso featured in the top 10 in all three sessions, with a high of P3 in FP2.
“Obviously we were not maybe the car to be on pole but I think enough to be P7, P8, but I found myself in the wrong place, wrong moment.
“This is Monaco, you know it’s difficult to get a clean lap, but I think I lost three tenths out of Turn 11 with a car just in front of me, and then another two tenths in the last corner with three cars that were parked there just to start in the lap.
“No one to blame, I think they cannot vanish in the very last moment out of the last corner, but yeah, a little bit unlucky today.
Looking ahead, Alonso explained how the team will very much treat the race as a test session now and continue to refine their car in preparation for the Canadian Grand Prix.
“[On Sunday, the aim is to] not crash, try to keep the car in one piece. Obviously, in this part of the year, we try to bring as many upgrades as possible. We just need to try to finish the race and get to Canada a little bit more prepared.
“I think it’s impossible [to pit early]. I did in lap seven in Imola and in lap eight half of the grid stopped. This is the way it is.”
