BARCELONA REVIEW BY BEN STEVENS
Saturday
A palpable anticipation filled the air on in
Barcelona. Friday had seen Mercedes reassert itself
over Ferrari, not so much for who would end up at
the front of the grid, but as to whether McLaren
could make it a whole day without an engine
failing.
Such were the hopes of the Spanish faithful,
who turned out in droves to simultaneously support
and lament the fortunes of their leading man,
Fernando Alonso. If only for one afternoon, they
had plenty of cause for celebration.
To say his P7 was unexpected would be a
bigger understatement than saying the Finns like
Kimi Raikkonen. Everything we’d seen on Friday
suggested he’d be lucky to finish a lap, let alone
make the top 10.
His performance was the definition of “god
mode”, and considering the way he has gone
through the desert only to perform such a miracle
makes the messianic treatment from his fans seem
all the more appropriate.
In all seriousness, it’s days like these that
show why we care so much about him in the first
place. No one else in the mid- or backfield gets the
attention he does, but how can you not talk about
him when his brilliance is so obvious. If he doesn’t
get another championship-contending car in his
career, it’ll be our loss just as much as his.
On a related note, lunch in McLaren’s
motorhome was an interesting affair, if only
because the spread was the complete opposite of the
Honda engine.