The Aston-Alonso Dilemma (OP-ED)

As we all know, Fernando Alonso has signed with Aston Martin for 2023. That’s old news, but what I believe could be a big problem is the magnitude of this dice roll. Hell, look what happened to Offset. (Distasteful, I know). Unless Alonso knows something we don’t, which I’m not entirely opposed to believing, this could torpedo his last days in F1.

Yes, Aston Martin does have a factory coming soon. But considering most of their success has come from xeroxing other teams’ designs, will they really be able to develop a car with originality? I don’t know, because they are one for two on copycat success, yet zero for one on originality. They were so bad at being original, that they copied a design a quarter through the season.

That brings me to Alonso, his talent and skill have lasted long past the typical prime of a driver. He seems as though he’ll be the Tom Brady of F1. With Alpine the engine wasn’t there last year, but the aerodynamics were excellent. This allowed Alonso to shine on low speed tracks. This year however, the engine is there, the car is a bit draggy, but it’s still a pretty amazing piece of engineering. And Alonso is extracting every ounce of performance from this year’s Alpine. So he decides to sign with a team that, just this year, screwed up copying designs.

See, the “expert engineers” at Aston Martin forgot that copying the design of one part of a winning car, doesn’t mean it will work with the rest of your car. You may be able to Frankenstein an 80’s Ram 1500 together, but not an F1 car. They tried to employ a design philosophy from one part, that was against the design philosophy of the rest of their car. These people don’t seem competent.

So, Alonso in my opinion, could be making the biggest mistake of his career. The team at Aston Martin has the potential to ruin his legacy. Sort of like they did Seb. The new fans, have only ever seen Seb in the back of the field, they didn’t see what we saw in 2010-2013. I really just don’t want that to happen to Alonso. And I feel like it will. It is my opinion that he should’ve taken that one year deal, waited for something to open up, or just re-sign with Alpine in 2024 because Alpine was inevitably going to screw over Oscar Piastri again. As long as Alonso didn’t fall off like Latifi he had job security at Alpine. Who can blame them for wanting insurance in case suddenly he loses his touch?