The true extent of the damage sustained by Fernando Alonso to his Aston Martin Formula 1 car at the United States Grand Prix has been officially revealed following the race in Austin.
The veteran driver picked up significant structural damage to the floor of his AMR26 chassis during a high-speed contact incident with Alex Albon on the opening lap of Sunday's main event.
The two-time world champion lined up 12th on the starting grid but dropped one position at the start before Albon launched a challenge against the Aston Martin driver at Turn 11.
The pair came to blows when Albon’s front-right wheel violently smashed into the bargeboard and floor edge on the left-hand side of the Spaniard's machine.
Alonso consequently lost four positions in the ensuing melee and could only manage a disappointing 16th-place finish at the checkered flag.
After the race concluded, Alonso openly blasted the low quality of drivers towards the back of the Formula 1 grid and claimed the heavy damage ruined any hopes of securing championship points.
"That was the biggest damage," Alonso said. "I think we lost half a second or more per lap. The car is destroyed, I saw it in parc ferme. Half of the floor is not there. I don't know how we kept on going and how we were semi-competitive."
"I imagine if the car was in one piece, probably today the points were a strong possibility because we were running P12 with half a car. I lost even further pieces of the floor. I couldn't turn. So we stopped. I thought about retiring the car. I was ready to switch it off."
"But then they put a new front wing and I went out again. Obviously the car was turning ok to the right and not ok to the left for the last 15 laps of the race. But we wanted to finish and collect a little bit more data."
"When you start at the back, there is this risk always. I think the quality of the drivers in the low third of the grid is very low. As we saw today with Alex. So I think we need to improve the car and start a little bit higher up."
Team ambassador and former F1 driver Pedro de la Rosa later shared striking images documenting the extent of the damage inflicted on Fernando Alonso’s car after the race.
He described the remarkable pace shown by Fernando Alonso as surprising despite the vehicle missing half of its floor, deflectors, and several crucial bargeboard elements.
Race control and the Formula 1 stewards at COTA ultimately decided that the opening lap collision required no further formal investigation.
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