Fernando Alonso once again cut a frustrated figure after a mechanical issue forced him to retire his car from the Italian Grand Prix.
The Spaniard has plenty of experience driving Formula 1 cars and knows better than most when something feels off with the one he is driving. So there would have been some alarm in the Alpine garage when, early in the race, he voiced his concerns over team radio.
He asked his engineers if there was a problem with the energy recovery and deployment system on his A522. After a brief check he was told that nothing concerning had been spotted, to which Alonso – clearly unconvinced – simply replied: "Wow."
But his car did suffer a race-ending problem, as he was forced to retire from the race on lap 32. Alonso, who will leave for Aston Martin at the end of the season, had suffered a loss of power, which Alpine later said in a statement was caused by a "suspected water pressure issue" which would be investigated further.
The 41-year-old, though, remained convinced that his engine had something wrong with it from the start. "There is something for sure on the engine wrong," he said in the media pen at Monza. "We lacked deployment at the beginning and we were cutting the energy very short on the straight, so it was difficult to keep some battles alive.
"But then something bigger happened because we had to stop the car. So let's see if the engine is alive for the future races. I think we were just on the edge of the points, P10, P9 maximum. So we were expecting more from this weekend, we were not fast enough. Let's see if in Singapore we go back to our best level."
It was a weekend to forget for Alpine, who failed to score points and saw their lead over midfield rivals McLaren cut. Alonso's team-mate, Esteban Ocon, started 14th with a grid penalty and finished 11th, just one place outside the points.
"Without the penalty this weekend we would have been in the points with both cars and it's a bit of a tough one to swallow, but we will come back stronger in the next one," said the Frenchman. "We were not as much at ease in comparison to Spa but again, it was going to be a strong weekend if we started further up the road, so I'm not too concerned."
Lando Norris finished seventh for McLaren, and would most likely have had both drivers in the points had Daniel Ricciardo not suffered a mechanical problem just a few laps from the end. Still, the gap to Alpine is now down to 18 points, setting up an eye-catching battle for fourth place in the constructors' championship.
