Fernando Alonso explains Imola qualifying shocker after rare Q1 exit

Fernando Alonso has revealed an undiagnosed issue forced him into the pit lane and thus knocking him out in Q1.

Alonso crashed out in FP3, putting him on the backfoot going into qualifying.

Aston Martin managed to repair his car in time for qualifying but Alonso continued to struggle, having another off-track moment.

Reflecting on qualifying, Alonso said: The team was incredible today. It was nice to witness that, the hours before qualifying, both teams together, Car 18 and Car 14 working flat out to put my car in qualifying. We managed to do so. So that was big thanks to everyone.

“Unfortunately, yeah, it was difficult to guess but we did fuel for the whole session, and then just doing some pit stops just to give me a little bit more laps into practice. And I set the best lap time in qualifying in the first attempt, and I think we have a lot of fuel in that moment of the session.

“And then the last attempt, when the car was lighter, we had to stop for an unknown problem that we had to box in the last attempt. All in all, one of those days, it’s not your day. The crash in FP3 and qualifying, not an easy one.”

Alonso will line up in Sunday’s race from 19th on the grid at a track which is renowned for it being tricky to overtake.

The two-time world champion believes Imola is the second most-difficult track to overtake, behind Monaco, meaning he’s set for a tough Sunday.

“I don’t know, I asked, they told me to box, I said sure, give me this lap, it’ll be enough to go through, they said yeah yeah box, I stopped now and I asked what was the problem, and they said it was still unknown, but we had to box,” Alonso said of the issue.

“Let’s see what it is, and what we can do tomorrow. I think it’s a very painful race, starting at the back. Imola is the second most-difficult track to overtake, just behind Monaco. Singapore is easier than Imola, just to put a number there.

“So I think it’s going to be tough, but hopefully we’ll learn something. There are some good days, bad days, this one was a bad one, and we need to keep it up.”