Formula One news

Alonso's engine problem didn't surprise the team

Fernando Alonso's time on track was cut short when the Spaniard blew up his Renault engine in the first free practice session. According to the team's head of engine operations, Denis Chevrier, the team wasn't that surprised when it blew even though it did cost Alonso a bit of valuable time on track.

Speaking about his day Alonso said: "It was a usual day of practice, except for a problem this morning which cost me a little track time. My mechanics did a remarkable job to fix the car and I was able to continue normally with my programme in the afternoon. I mainly concentrated on evaluating the tyres and set-up work based on the information we collected last week. We must now try and make the most of the final practice session tomorrow morning, but we are going in the right direction."

Denis Chevrier, Renault's head of engine track operations explained: "Our test engines today had a similar risk to the one that broke at the last race in Magny-Cours. So the engine problem for Fernando is something that we were already aware of and had identified, and that is going to help our understanding of the problem that is affecting us at the moment. However, for the race engines, we have already taken a number of precautions and we are therefore not particularly worried for the race this weekend."

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