Nico Rosberg thinks Fernando Alonso has ‘definitely’ underachieved in one area

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Nico Rosberg thinks Fernando Alonso has ‘definitely’ underachieved in one area for the Formula 1 career the Aston Martin driver and two-time champion has relished.

Minardi afforded Alonso his debut in the pinnacle of motorsport back in March 2001 at the Australian Grand Prix. While he then spent 2002 on the sidelines as a test driver for Renault, the move laid the foundation to win his titles in 2005 and 2006 with the team from Enstone.

This weekend’s Hungarian GP is even the 394th Grand Prix that Alonso has entered so far to further build his record tally. Starting on Sunday will also move the 43-year-old to 391 starts and stretch another record. Kimi Raikkonen has started the second-most Grand Prix on 350.

Nico Rosberg ‘surprised’ how few pole positions Fernando Alonso has

Alonso has made 34 of his career starts with Aston Martin after joining the Silverstone team in 2023. The switch also yielded eight podiums last season but his best finish so far this year is P5. Aston Martin have also not yet seen Alonso qualify higher than P3 for the Chinese GP.

Rosberg believes qualifying has never been where Alonso has performed the best across his spells at Minardi, Renault, Ferrari, McLaren, Alpine or Aston Martin. But the fact that he has also only ever scored 22 pole positions in Formula 1 flummoxes the 2016 drivers’ champion.

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Given Alonso has won 32 Grand Prix so far and made 106 career podiums, Rosberg finds his lack of poles particularly surprising. Alonso also last started a Grand Prix from P1 on the grid at the 2012 German GP at Hockenheim. He took his first pole at the 2003 Malaysian GP, too.

“Qualifying was never his greatest strength,” Rosberg told Sky Sports F1 (20/07, 12:06). “He only has 22 pole positions which, for the career that Fernando had, is definitely surprisingly low compared to his [number of] race wins.”

Fernando Alonso has the 15th most pole positions in Formula 1 history

Alonso scored 16 of his 22 pole positions in Formula 1 with Renault, as well as just two with McLaren and four with Ferrari. His title-winning seasons also returned the majority of those with six in 2005 and again in 2006. Alonso has never taken more than two in any other year.

Renault saw Alonso score his first pole positions in his first season with the team in 2003 at the Malaysian GP and Hungarian GP. Both circuits have even proven to be amongst his best tracks with two poles – only at Silverstone with two British GP poles has Alonso taken more.

But failing to score a pole position since the 2012 German GP has seen Alonso drop to 15th in the Formula 1 record books. Lewis Hamilton leads the way with his 104 poles to Michael Schumacher (68), Ayrton Senna (65), Sebastian Vettel (57) and Max Verstappen (40) so far.

Charles Leclerc has also taken more pole positions in Formula 1 than Alonso with 24, all of which he has scored with Ferrari since 2019. Valtteri Bottas also ranks 17th in the all-time list with 20, all of which the Finn scored with Mercedes across the 2017 to 2021 seasons.