Despite a lackluster 2025 F1 Japanese GP race, Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso has chosen to focus on the experience, rather than his results, at Suzuka. The 43-year-old F1 veteran finished a disappointing P11, behind Haas’ Oliver Bearman (P10). This, unfortunately was, yet another poor race from Alonso, who sits 17th in the World Drivers’ Championship standings with 0 points, 10 less than teammate Lance Stroll.
A demanding race for Alonso
Despite driving a tough race against Alpine’s Pierre Gasly, and Racing Bulls’ Yuki Tsunoda, the Spaniard, who started the race P12 could not make his way into the points. Unlike many of his competitors, however, Alonso did not describe the race as boring. Instead, he stated that, though slow, it had been demanding, especially in the first half.
“It was difficult, not boring, because I had the first half of the race, Gasly, within one second behind, in the second part Yuki, so I couldn’t make a mistake in one corner because they will overtake, so it was a very demanding race for us, but slow in general.”
He added that Aston Martin had lacked the pace needed to compete against their opponents and stated that this had further complicated their race around a circuit where overtaking was usually a difficult feat.
“We didn’t have the pace, and about the circuit, yeah, it’s Suzuka. I don’t remember a race even in the past that we see too many overtakings here without the weather changing.”
Alonso: 2025 F1 Japanese GP “another great Suzuka” experience
Alonso critised commentary descibing Suzuka as a “boring” race. He explained that different circuits offered different challenges. Suzuka’s strength, he stated, was the high-adrenaline Saturday Qualifying session.
“It seems like we repeat always on Thursday how great Suzuka is, how great Monaco is, the glamout, the spectacular weekend. Then on Sunday, we wake up and say, “Monaco is boring, what can we do to the track? Suzuka is boring.”
“This is Formula 1, and Suzuka is great, first because Saturday is incredibly high adrenaline. So that’s good that is.”
While Alonso understands that the use of a one-stop strategy did not allow for an especially “fun race”, he believes that critics would have complained if a different strategy had been used.
“Yeah, maybe one stop was not maybe the fun race that we were hoping for, and in the past with multiple stops, maybe it is a bit different. But yeah, when we don’t have grip, we complain that there is no grip, and when we have too many stops, we complain the tyres don’t last.”
Instead of focusing on the negatives of the 2025 F1 Japanese GP weekend, Alonso chose to focus on the positives, describing his experience as “another great Suzuka” race.
“So instead of seeing the negative part of the weekend, I try to enjoy what we experienced this weekend, and it was another great Suzuka [race].”
Aston Martin “cannot achieve” a top 10 finish at the moment
With Aston Martin leaving Suzuka without any new points, Alonso hopes that Bahrain will be a new opportunity for the Silverstone-based team to put themselves in the championship fight.
Alonso could not definitively say why Aston Martin had strugged so much during the Japanese GP, despite having had a strong Sector 1 performance during Saturday’s Qualifying. However, he did recognise the AMR25’s lack of pace—a problem haunting the team since the start of the season.
“Yeah, I don’t know,” Alonso said when asked why Aston Martin had failed to perform against their midfield rivals, “I think we still need to check all the data.
“At the moment, there is ot enough pace. We seen to struggle to be in the Q3. We’ve never been so far and then in the race, to be in the top 10 with a normal race, we cannot achieve it.”
“It’s clear we need to improve,” he stated.
Alonso “looking forward” to “nice opportunity” in Bahrain
The Aston Martin driver hopes that such improvement will come in Bahrain. He described the return to the Sakhir International Circuit as “a nice opportunity” which would allow the team to test some new ideas on the familiar track.
“In Bahrain, we have nice opportunity. After the winter testing, with some different ideas, maybe after the early learnings of the three first races. So yeah, I’m looking forward to keep developing the car.”
Verstappen’s 2025 championship fight reminds Alonso of his in 2012
Having previously praised Verstappen’s pole lap in Saturday’s qualifying as “magical”, Alonso empathised with Red Bull Racing driver’s recent struggles with his RB21. He compared Verstappen’s 2025 season to his in 2012 where he lost the World Drivers’ Championship to Sebastian Vettel by three points.
“I’ve been there, I’ve been fighting for world championships with the third, fourth, fastest car, so you know, at the end it’s difficult, as it was difficult for me to beat Vettel, so I hope for him he can fight until the end, but they need to improve a little bit with the machine.”
While Alonso believes that Verstappen’s four titles have given him the experience to fight of the championship title in a less competitive car, he warned that it would not be an easy feat.
“Well, we won four, so he can fight with a little bit less competitive car. But yeah, it’s hard and I think the people don’t realise how difficult it is and how you need to make it perfect every weekend.”
“And he’s doing it so far, and as I said, it reminds me of my 2012 in a way, when the car was not so good and we fought for the championship.”
Alonso concluded: “But to win it at the end, let’s see. I hope for him [that] he can do it.”
