Fernando Alonso names the ‘most demanding’ race of his F1 career as he reaches 400 GP milestone

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When Fernando Alonso gets into his car on Friday at the Mexico City Grand Prix, he’ll be reaching a landmark that just 10 years ago, nobody would have thought was possible.

Aston Martin are the sixth team Fernando Alonso has driven for after Minardi, Renault, McLaren, Ferrari and Alpine.

Remarkably, they decided to sign the two-time world champion after his 40th birthday and he’s already signed a contract that will see him racing in Formula 1 beyond the age of 45.

The Mexico City Grand Prix represents Alonso’s 400th Grand Prix entry and in that time he’s raced against multiple world champions and at dozens of different circuits.

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In fact, when Alonso made his F1 debut in 2001, he was racing against Jean Alesi who took part in his first race in 1989, meaning a driver who is still currently on the grid raced against someone whose career started 35 years ago.

It’s a remarkable achievement and in an interview with Aston Martin’s official website, Alonso shared plenty of interesting details about his career.

One interesting question Alonso was asked related to the toughest race of his career so far.

The Spaniard has driven in torrential rain, strong winds and endurance events that required hours of non-stop concentration.

However, the 2023 Qatar Grand Prix sits at the top of Alonso’s most difficult Formula 1 races.

Fernando Alonso admits 2023 Qatar Grand Prix was his ‘most demanding’ Formula 1 race

Asked about his most difficult races, Alonso said: “Difficult races… I’m sure we have a lot of those in my memory. It’s not easy to choose one.

“Singapore is always very demanding. I think, physically, the most demanding race I ever did was Qatar 2023 in F1.

“That was quite extreme in the way that we could not really finish the race in good conditions. It was the same for many drivers. The temperature and humidity were very extreme there.

“Mentally, I would choose another race which for me was very demanding, and it was the 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps in the World Endurance Championship in 2019.

“I was with Toyota back then and we had four seasons of weather conditions that day.

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“We had differing stints with dry tyres and maximum pace. We had rain. We had snow at one point. The race didn’t stop. They didn’t put out the red flag, so we kept on racing.

“I think, mentally, to keep the focus over those stints and not making any mistakes with the changeable conditions on track was for me very demanding mentally.

“I still remember that I was exhausted after the race from the mental exercise that we had to do.”

Why the 2023 Qatar Grand Prix was such a difficult race

This year’s Qatar Grand Prix will take place at the beginning of December, but last season the race was scheduled for the beginning of October.

Despite being run at night, the temperatures were still exceedingly hot, making life very difficult for the drivers.

It was the scene of Max Verstappen winning his third world championship after Sergio Perez crashed out in the Sprint Race, but by the end of Sunday’s Grand Prix, few drivers were in the mood to celebrate.

Charles Leclerc admitted at the time he expected a very difficult race weekend, while a collision between the two Mercedes drivers was also a major talking point.

Pirelli made life even more difficult for the drivers by setting an 18-lap maximum tyre stint due to the worries about how the heat would impact their performance.

That meant that not only were drivers at their limits in the heat, they were also pushing every lap at near-qualifying levels as they didn’t have to look after their tyres.

Williams driver Logan Sargeant was forced to retire from the race due to heat exhaustion, while Esteban Ocon vomited in his helmet twice on the way to the chequered flag.

This year’s later start date should hopefully avoid these issues but it’s no wonder Alonso picked it as his toughest Grand Prix so far.