Fernando Alonso has admitted that he only intended to remain in Formula 1 for “seven or eight years” when he embarked on his debut season in 2001.
The Spanish driver entered with the backmarker Minardi side before going on to accrue 15 race victories on his way to successive titles with the Renault team by the end of 2006.
But after enduring several missed opportunities at Ferrari alongside two false dawns with McLaren and an unsuccessful second spell with Renault, Alonso turned to retirement at the end of 2018 to compete in other forms of racing.
Alonso would return, however, with the Renault-owned Alpine outfit in 2021 and surpassed the record number of starts in F1 during the second year of his comeback.
Encountering his 20th season in the sport this year, Alonso, now of Aston Martin, has revealed that he had only originally planned to stay around for less than a decade when he debuted.
“When I started in Formula 1, my idea was to be [here] for seven or eight years,” Alonso, 42, said recently during an interview with Bang & Olufsen.
“Then I won the two championships and I thought, I will race maybe one or two more years, and then I will stop. So that was my idea.
“Now I find myself with the longest career ever in Formula 1 and I’m still fresh, I’m still motivated. I am still enjoying every single day. I wake up in the morning and I’m happy of what I’m doing.
“So there is a few more years I think more for me and hopefully, with a title contender in the future.”
Following a frustrating second season with Alpine riddled with reliability issues, Alonso announced during last year’s summer break he was making a shock move to Aston Martin for 2023.
Alonso’s switch has coincided with the Silverstone-based outfit catapulting up the pecking order and establishing itself as an unforeseen front-running contender.
The British marque’s highly improved AMR23 car has enabled Alonso to score three consecutive podiums to open the 2023 season, resulting in Aston Martin sitting second in the Constructors’ table.
While Alonso insists Aston Martin’s overall aim is to eventually fight for Championships, the two-time title winner asserts that expectations surrounding F1’s surprise package must be contained after successive past finishes of seventh in the standings.
“That’s the aim for sure,” he boasted when asked about Aston Martin becoming a contender for race wins and titles. “But I think at the moment we have to keep the feet in the ground.
“The aim for the team is just to have a good season. They were struggling a lot in 2022. So I think we have to walk before [we] run.
“And I think this 2023 campaign is just about getting better, getting to know the car better, start a new project from day one. That’s where we are at the moment.
“Hopefully we will have more podiums. Hopefully we fight for race wins. But I think to fight for the championship, I think we need to, as I said, set the team a little bit before doing that.”
Since defeating the legendary Michael Schumacher to clinch his second title on the spin in 2006, Alonso was then in contention for the Drivers’ Championship at the final round across three of the following six seasons.
However, no further title followed, and Alonso hasn’t been in contention for the top prize since coming up agonisingly short in the final round in 2012.
The ex-Ferrari driver also hasn’t stood on the top step of a podium since he claimed victory for the fourth time in front of his adoring home crowd at the 2013 Spanish Grand Prix.
Despite expecting to prolong his stay in search of that elusive third title, Alonso has conceded that matching Schumacher’s record tally of seven World Championships – something he looked destined to do and Lewis Hamilton has since done in 2020 – is unlikely given his age.
“When you race for many years, obviously you start breaking records,” Alonso continued. “But I think the only thing that matters is to win and to break the record of championships.
“At the moment that’s probably unreachable because seven of Michael and seven of Hamilton are out of the possibility. But that will be the aim ultimately.”
