Last week, Fernando Alonso confirmed he will not be retiring at the end of this year’s Formula 1 season, committing to a 2027 campaign during which he will turn 46 years old.
In Sunday’s (Oct. 4) Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia, Alonso proved that he still hasn’t lost a step.
The veteran took advantage of a chaotic race that began in wet conditions, quickly went into dry conditions, and saw two safety car periods to pull off an unlikely result.
Alonso began the race unluckily, with Aston Martin deciding to start on dry tires instead of intermediates. He and the other dry tire starters fell behind dramatically, but then got lucky with a safety car period on the ninth lap.
He’d spend the first portion of the race after that right behind teammate Lance Stroll. Alonso would run a bit late in the pit cycle, an extra two laps over Stroll.
But the hard tires the team switched him to were the golden ticket. He came out 4 seconds behind Stroll, but stormed past him just four laps later to move into 12th.
On the next lap, he blew past old teammate Esteban Ocon to take 11th, setting his sights for Arvid Lindblad right ahead.
Lindblad was born on August 8, 2007. This was a little over nine months after Alonso won his second and, to date, final World Drivers’ Championship in October of 2006.
The lion waited a few laps behind the mouse, waiting for the right chance to pounce. He’d do so on lap 41, when Lindblad had trouble accelerating out of a corner and Alonso motored past in a Honda engine that has spent most of the year being held together by bubble gum and a wish.
It looked like the final laps of the race would come down between Alonso and another one of the veterans on the grid, Nico Hulkenberg, when a full safety car came out.
Everybody pitted for fresh tires. Alonso maintained tenth when there was big trouble ahead. George Russell had an engine failure from third, and Lando Norris ran off the track while running eighth.
The good news was that this moved Alonso up to eighth. The bad news was that Norris as still in the race, and restarted in 11th with four laps to go.
Norris made quick work of Lindblad and Hulkenberg to move back up to ninth with three laps to go.
Alonso, the oldest driver in F1 since Graham Hill in 1975, then had to try and defend against the reigning world champion, in a car that had three points on the year entering the race.
Norris got close. But Alonso had just enough traction coming out of turn 2 to hold off Norris and finish eighth. One final lunge into turn 15 on the last lap by Norris wasn’t enough; Alonso closed the inside right on him, and drove off the corner onto the finish line.
“It was a difficult race, man” Alonso said on the cool down lap over his radio. “In the beginning, it was so hard… we did our best today everyone, great job.”
Alonso scored four points on the day, more than doubling Aston Martin’s point total on the year. They’re now more-or-less guranteed at least a tenth place finish in the constructor standings, as Cadillac has failed to gain any points and the green machine has seven on the year. He moved up to 17th in the driver standings, ahead of both Williams drivers.
Moving on from Sepang International Circuit, most of the last seven races on the calendar don’t seem to be right for the Aston Martin or their Honda engine.
Still, if there’s more chaos, and they can show more pace, it wouldn’t be a surprise if they gain even more points and challenge Williams for ninth in the standings. In spite of having a car that couldn’t even complete half a race at the start of the year.
Michael has watched NASCAR for over 25 years and has covered it on-and-off for 14.
In addition to Frontstretch he also writes sporadically for his own websites GrandPrixFocus.com and StockCarFocus.com.
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