Martin Brundle unimpressed with ‘clumsy’ F1 driver during Mexico qualifying yesterday

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Aston Martin driver Fernando Alonso had a Mexican Grand Prix qualifying to forget and Martin Brundle was unimpressed with one aspect of his session.

Brundle was commentating alongside David Croft for Sky Sports F1 as Charles Leclerc took an unlikely pole position.

There were plenty of twists and turns throughout the session as the performance of some cars drastically changed throughout the hour.

Congestion in the pit lane during Q1 and Q2 caused problems of its own with plenty of drivers under investigation by the time qualifying had finished, although no penalties were handed out as a result.

One man had a big impact on the first session of the evening and that was Fernando Alonso.

He made an uncharacteristic mistake coming out of Turn 3 that ended up shaping how the session ended.

Martin Brundle was surprised by Alonso’s mistake in qualifying as Aston Martin continue to struggle following a stunning start to the season.

Neither driver made it into the top 10 and will have it all to do going into today’s race.

Brundle unimpressed with Alonso during Mexican GP qualifying

In the final minutes of the Q1, Alonso got on the power too early as the first chicane and ended up spinning, bringing out the yellow flags.

It contributed to Lando Norris’s early exit and didn’t help his teammate Lance Stroll who also finished in the bottom five.

Logan Sargeant also picked up a penalty for overtaking Yuki Tsunoda during the incident and Brundle said: “Yeah, you’ve got to get past the green flag though.

“It was quite a clumsy little spin from Fernando Alonso, I must say.

Commentator David Croft added: “Not the sort of spin you would expect from a driver in his 374^th Grand Prix.

Brundle concluded: “Indeed, he put too much throttle on like that in the corner.”

Alonso ended qualifying in 13^th place behind the likes of Nico Hulkenberg and Zhou Guanyu, but ahead of Alex Albon who was widely tipped to thrive yesterday.

Brundle’s suggestion that Alonso tried to get on the throttle too quickly highlights the problems Aston Martin were having in qualifying.

It’s not unusual to see Lance Stroll in the bottom five but his teammate’s recent struggle shows that the car hasn’t improved at the same rate as many of the teams around them.

Aston Martin fans will be hoping that’s because they started development early on their 2024 car.

Alonso will be hoping he can find enough pace in the last four race weekends to hang onto fourth in the Drivers Championship.