Fernando Alonso has very modest aims for this weekend's Russian Grand Prix. Just for once, he'd like to see both McLaren cars last the full race distance.
It hasn't happened so far in 2017. Stoffel Vandoorne managed to make it to the finish in Melbourne, but Alonso himself hasn't yet seen the chequered flag from the cockpit. Although classified in 14th place in Bahrain, he had already pulled into the pits by the time the race ended.
"A positive result for us in Sochi will be to finish the race with both cars," Alonso admitted. "We’ve suffered a few reliability issues over the past couple of weekends."
Alonso is still getting his head back in Formula 1 mode. He spent last weekend in the US in preparation for his Indianapolis 500 bid in May. That meant he opted out of the post-Bahrain test session at Sakhir.
"I followed the test in Bahrain," he said. "I’m pleased that we were able to secure a lot of valuable data from both the car and the power unit.
"I know everyone at McLaren-Honda is working hard to put that to good use to aid our progress as quickly as possible," he added.
Even so, he admitted that it was asking a lot of the team to make significant progress in just a few days.
"The season is long, but there isn’t much time between races – especially fly-aways – for development," he agreed. However, there had been a positive finish to the test: the McLaren showed improved reliability on the second day.
"The laps we managed on the final day of the test were a big positive for us," he noted. "Hopefully [that] will be beneficial to us over the next few races."
Both McLarens will be equipped with a new Honda upgrade to the MGU-H this weekend in a bid to boost the MCL32's reliability.
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