Formula 1: What is Fernando Alonso's greatest career achievement? Fernando Alonso may be a two-time Formula 1 world champion, with a reputation as one of the most talented drivers the sport has ever produced, but he has named an off-track achievement as the best moment of his career - winning the prestigious Premio Principe de Asturias award.
The award is given annually in Spain by an individual who has excelled in science, humanities, public affairs and sport to a high level. Alonso was given the honour in 2005, and for him, that eclipses any success behind the wheel.
“The Premio Principe de Asturias is probably the biggest thing I achieved, even more than any Formula 1 championship,” Alonso said. “That kind of award is about changing people’s lives and introducing a lot of people into one sport. So, those kinds of things are much bigger than any trophy.”.
Alonso, who left F1 after the 2018 season after 17 years, is proud that he has been able to catalyse interest in the sport in his home country of Spain, which previously had little enthusiasm for motorsport. “I am very proud,” he continued.
“I think you only realise with time, when you see how many people follow the sport now in Spain, in my region in Asturias, how many people travel to Oviedo to visit the museum, to have the first go in go-karts.
“A lot of people started following Formula 1 and not Formula 1, motorsports in general, in my country, which definitely was not a tradition. “We were not broadcasting the races in 2001, 2002, I think it started in the middle of 2003.
“Something that is unthinkable now, when Formula 1 is the second or third sport in Spain, that’s something that I feel really proud of. Scuderia Ferrari have officially sent former team principal Maurizio Arrivabene packing after the conclusion of the 2018 Formula 1 season, which saw the team finish second in the constructor standings to Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport yet again.
NEXT NEWS:Formula 1: Ferrari wrong to fire Maurizio Arrivabene?. The controlling powers of the Scuderia Ferrari Formula 1 team have made the call to send Maurizio Arrivabene on his way. But was the right person fired?.
But did Arrivabene deserve to be fired?. There are a plethora of reasons as to why a high-profile racing team might feel the need to fire their team principal. If a team were underperforming or committing key mistakes at the management level, it would come as no surprise to see a changing of the guard in the hopes of seeing improvement.
But why would Ferrari fire their team principal after their most successful season in decades? Ferrari are famous for removing players when certain goals are not met in ways that boggle the minds of level-headed observers.
Arrivabene joined Ferrari after Marco Mattiacci delivered a woefully unsuccessful 2014 season, which resulted in them failing to fourth place in the constructor championship by scoring only 216 points. In the four seasons prior to Arrivabene joining Ferrari, the team scored an average of 336.25 points per season with an average finishing position of 30 in the constructor standings.
In the four seasons during which Arrivabene was the team principal, they saw a drastic increase in points scored per season with a four-season average of 479.75 points, marking an increase of 143.5 championship points from their previous four-season average, with an average finishing position of 2.25 in the constructor standings.
This trend shows an improvement in the season-to-season performance as Ferrari slowly closed the gap that Mercedes have enjoyed in the V6 turbo hybrid era. But what were some of the factors that might have cost them points over the course of a season? Was it Arrivabene’s fault that they were unable to officially dethrone the German juggernaut?.
Using 2018 as a recent example, what were some instances that resulted in Ferrari walking away from a Grand Prix with fewer points than they could have?. In the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, Sebastian Vettel attempted a pass on Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas where it did not need to happen, which resulted in what could have been a victory for him become a fourth place finish while Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton went on to win the race.
During the French Grand Prix, Vettel again made contact with Bottas, this time in the race’s first lap, which caused him to finish in fifth place. Then during his home German Grand Prix, he suffered a lapse of focus and stranded his car in a gravel trap while leading by a huge margin late in the race.
Finally, near the end of the 2018 season, Vettel spun in the Italian, Japanese and United States Grands Prix, causing him to throw even more points away. During the 2018 season alone, he had the ability to gain an additional 90 to 93 points relative to Hamilton, but he did not do so due to mistakes unrelated to Arrivabene.
Hamilton went on to win his fifth career championship by 88 points over Vettel (408 to 320). But when the goals of winning the driver and constructor championships are not met, who gets to shoulder the blame? Ferrari have a famous way of managing to turn situations sour with employees.
One such situation was the Jacky Ickx saga of the 1970s that included a mid-season departure due to an unsafe and equally uncompetitive car. Ickx went on to claim six victories in the famed 24 Hours of Le Mans, beating Ferrari-entered cars each time. Such is the current situation at Ferrari.
Yes, Mercedes won both the driver and the constructor championship for the fifth consecutive season, but did Arrivabene deserve to be fired after four seasons of improvement, especially with 2018 being the closest any team has come to beating Mercedes in the V6 turbo hybrid era?.
The 2019 Formula 1 season will be a telling one as Mattia Binotto takes over as Ferrari’s team principal with the young Charles Leclerc filling the vacancy caused by the unnecessarily convoluted departure of Kimi Raikkonen and with four-time champion Sebastian Vettel coming off a season during which he served as his own worst enemy.
Do you think that Maurizio Arrivabene was the right man to shoulder the blame?.