Formula One news

Alonso can't believe he won

An overjoyed Fernando Alonso could hardly believe he won the Singapore Grand Prix after starting the race in fifteenth. The Renault driver ended up so far down the grid after a fuel feed problem put him out of qualifying.

"It's a fantastic first podium of the season and first win," Alonso beamed. "I'm extremely happy and can't believe it right now. I think I need a couple of days to realise that we won a race this year which seemed impossible all season to be that close to the top guys."

"We've been competitive since Friday and unlucky in qualifying but lucky today," he added. "We started at the back and the first safety car helped me a lot and I was able then to win the race. We chose to do a very aggressive first stint because we knew starting fifteenth you can't overtake and we thought about one stop but had concerned about the brakes, so we tried something very different with a short first stint, try to make as many places and see from there."

"The start was good, but not good enough but then we got lucky with the safety car," he added. "But after that we got in front and were able to build a gap to the guys behind us. The car was very good. I was with the better tyre in the last stint so had a bit of an advantage over Nico and I was able to pull away."

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