In just a few days the Formula 1 circus made the 8,000+ miles journey to Qatar, crossing 11 time zones, for the penultimate race of the season & swapping the neon lights of Las Vegas in the Nevada desert for the bright lights of Lusail on the tip of the Arabian peninsula. En route to Qatar, Mike Krack commented, “As back-to-back races go, Las Vegas and Qatar couldn't be more different. Everything is opposite. We've moved from a street track with mostly low-speed corners to a purpose-built, permanent track where everything is high-speed. Vegas was cold and dry, Qatar is hot and humid. We've swapped from the softest tyres to the hardest and we've switched to the Sprint weekend format.” We already know that Alonso was looking forward to getting back into the car for Qatar. How would it work out?
As this race included the last of the season’s Sprint races in the schedule, the Free Practice (FP) session would be the only chance that the teams and drivers would get to acquaint themselves with the track and conditions, which were windier & cooler than was expected. As usual, the AM drivers used the session to collect data on the medium and soft compound tyres. After 15 mins, Stroll was only 14th & Alonso 18th. On one of his fast laps Alonso had to weave through 2 cars that were on a slowdown lap, literally having to pull off track to give Alonso room to pass safely once they got news he was coming. At the halfway point, the driver’s positions swapped round & Alonso was 14th & Stroll 18th and they continued to improve, such that with 15 mins remaining Alonso was in P7 & Stroll P15. By the time the chequered flag was being waved to end the session, Stroll was P7, Alonso P12. A mere 3 hours later it was time for Sprint Qualifying & it took a short while for any cars to go on track & start setting lap times in SQ1. With just 5 mins left the AMs looked solid - Alonso P7, Stroll P9. But with the track constantly improving they were tumbling down the order and it was all going to be up to the outcomes on the very final flying laps. They managed to haul their cars up to 6th (Alonso) & 7th (Stroll) but the round ended with Alonso in 8th & Stroll 10th. It looked promising. SQ2 got underway & passed very quickly and after all the initial fast laps were finished & with just 5 mins to go, Alonso was P8, Stroll P9. After their final flying laps & with the chequered flag already out the 2 drivers seemed to be through to the next round, although precariously in 9th & 10th. It wasn’t good enough, Gasly and Albon pushed them out & Alonso ended up in P11 (by 4/100ths of a second) & Stroll P14. That would be the end of Sprint Qualifying for them & where they would start the Sprint race on Saturday afternoon. Norris would start in pole position with Russell alongside him on the front row.
Despite starting in 11th Alonso was being very positive and was quoted as saying, “We have a chance to fight for points in the Sprint…”. From the start of the Sprint race the 2 AM drivers gained a place each on the opening lap. After 5 laps Alonso was still 10th & Stroll 13th but then the Spaniard was passed by Magnussen (exceeding track limits after the overtake in my view). Not to be outdone, Alonso stayed within a second of Magnussen and used DRS to his benefit. However, on lap 11, Alonso went off track chasing Magnussen, but got back on track immediately, with no damage or loss sustained. That was how it finished though, with Alonso in 11th & Stroll 13th. What was curious was that Stroll had set the highest reading through the speed trap - 207mph. At the front, Norris let Piastri through at the very finish, allowing Piastri to take the victory. That was returning the favour to Piastri, who was given team orders in Brazil to let Norris through for a win, while the Driver’s Championship was still in play.
No sooner had the sand settled, it was time for Qualifying for the main race. Out went the 2 AMR24s to set their preliminary fast laps in Q1 and Stroll managed to go P1 & Alonso P2, the cars having undergone set-up changes after the Sprint race, which seemed to be working. It was too early to get hopes up though, as only 5 other drivers had posted a fast time. As other drivers came out and set faster times out came the pair to haul themselves back up the order. Alonso managed to set the 3rd fastest time & Stroll 5th. With 5 mins left Alonso was still 3rd but Stroll’s time was now 9th fastest. As a precaution the Aston Martins came out to put in final fast laps, but they didn't bother to complete them as both progressed through to Q2 – Alonso in 6th, Stroll 13th. Q2 didn’t start too well for Alonso, who had to back out of his first fast run when he went off track, lost time & had to come back to the garage. Stroll only went 14th on his first run. There was some tyre management going on, as due to having utilised tyres for the Sprints the team were running out of fresh tyres & needed to keep some for the race. This also explained why Alonso wasn't sent out immediately again to set a fast time but was kept in the garage. With the clocking counting down to the last 5 mins both Aston Martins were in the elimination zone, 14th & 15th. Alonso came out and, nail-bitingly, put himself into the top 10, in 8th. Stroll however, had a big snap at turn 1 on his final fast lap & lost half a second and finished 15th. He reported that he didn't think the tyres were in quite the right window at the start of the lap because the grip just wasn't there, probably due to not getting enough heat into them on the out lap. In the final qualifying round Alonso set the 3rd fastest time on his initial run but had the time deleted for exceeding track limits. Back into the garage he came for a new set of 'boots' on which he managed to stay on track for the last qualifying lap and put himself 8th. Max Verstappen secured another pole position but was under investigation for going too slowly & deemed to be impeding Russell, who was coming round on a fast lap. Later on the Stewards stripped Verstappen of the pole position & gave him a 1 place grid penalty for impeding Russell.
At the start of the race the following day, although Russell lined up in pole position, he lost the lead instantly to Verstappen and was passed by Norris very soon after the race got underway. Alonso meanwhile, overtook Hamilton off the start, but Perez passed both of them, so Alonso stayed 8th overall. Then we had the first collision of the race when Hulkenberg went into Ocon and pushed him into Colapinto. This required the Mercedes safety car to come out, as Ocon’s and Colapinto’s damaged cars had to be cleared away. At the same time Albon got hit by Stroll’s Aston Martin when he just didn't turn in enough so he had to come into the pits for a precautionary check. All the cars were still following the safety car but Stroll still came out 17th. At the end of lap 4 the safety car headed into the pits and the race resumed but Alonso lost 2 places off the restart & dropped to 10th. Then Magnussen passed Alonso on the next lap and he was now 11th & out of the points. Shortly after, he was passed by Gasly! Alonso came on the team radio complaining about lack of speed down the main straight. Stroll in the meantime appeared to be suffering from damage to his car & was passed by Hulkenberg, leaving him 18th & last of the cars that were still running. It looked like the team had made the decision to retire Stroll’s the car when it was announced that he'd been handed a 10 second penalty for causing the collision with Albon. Stroll was told to come in to take the penalty in this race and sent out again for another lap before he came in again to retire from the race. Otherwise, he would have had to carry the penalty and serve it at the next race, which clearly was not desirable. While that was going on Alonso had gone off track and came back on into the path of Magnussen. This was deemed to be unsafe and the incident was investigated but the Stewards decided no penalty would be given. With that out of the way Alonso got back to racing & passed Tsunoda around turn 1 on lap 14 and stayed ahead. Alonso then benefitted from Russell having a slow pit stop & coming out behind Alonso, who was now up to 10th & back in the points. When Magnussen pitted Alonso gained another place. Alonso was doing a sterling job keeping Russell at bay - it seemed Russell couldn't get through the corners on his new hard tyres as fast as Alonso. Just after the halfway stage of the race the next major event was about to unfold. The wing mirror on Albon’s Williams had detached & came to rest on the main straight but off the racing line. However, a couple of laps later Bottas drove right over it, smashed it to pieces which scattered all over the track. The shards gave Sainz & Hamilton tyre punctures forcing them to come into the pits, so it was decided to deploy the safety car. Taking advantage of this Alonso came into the pits to change tyres, which the team achieved in 2.7 seconds and he came out 9th on new hard tyres. Then the team decided to take a massive gamble & brought Alonso back into the pits to put him on a last set of new medium tyres. He was released into the path of Magnussen & the 2 drivers went wheel to wheel slowly down the pit lane and Alonso managed to accelerate away faster once they were on track. The gamble was that Alonso would be able to go to the end of race on the potentially faster tyres. Right now, he was in 10th with just 19 laps to go with all the cars bunched up behind the safety car for the restart. It pulled in on the next lap & it appeared that Aston’s decision was justified as Alonso gained a place & was up to 8th after the restart. Then, more incidents. First, Perez lost drive at the restart, spun & went off. Then Hulkenberg’s Haas had the rear snap round, sending the car off track & into the gravel, putting them both out of the race. The safety car was sent out again until the track was cleared. At the restart Alonso was all over the back of Sainz’s Ferrari. However, once DRS was enabled Sainz benefited from being within a second of Gasly in front of him & stayed out of Alonso’s clutches. However, when Norris was called into the pits to serve a 10 second stop-go penalty (for not slowing down enough when double yellow flags were out) Alonso was elevated up 7th. Norris came out last, but that position fell to Hamilton when he had to serve a drive through penalty for speeding in pit lane with 10 laps to go. Although these last 2 were in much faster cars and Norris scythed his way up the order, there weren’t enough laps to displace Alonso & 7th is where the Aston Martin finished, securing 6 valuable points for the team, the first ones since Singapore in September. Verstappen won the race and McLaren & Ferrari now have to take the Constructors Championship battle to Abu Dhabi next weekend.
After the race, a very pleased Alonso remarked, “The car felt a little stronger than yesterday and we capitalised on some of the action ahead of us with some retirements and penalties, but we were in the right place at the right time. It's a good time to get some points on the board and hopefully we can carry this form into Abu Dhabi and finish the season on a high." Stroll’s views were less enthusiastic, "The car wasn't feeling right from the start of the race. I locked the front left at Turn 2 which was strange because it's not a corner you brake that much for. Then at Turn 5 I made contact with Albon which was completely unintentional. I wasn't trying to race him.”
Now, it’s off, just down the Gulf, to Abu Dhabi, for the final race of the 2024 season this coming weekend.