Fernando Alonso says he knows "what his role is" at Aston Martin, and it involves multiple objectives, one of which is to help Lance Stroll pick up the baton in the future to become the team's "leader".
Stroll is in the midst of a difficult campaign with his father Lawrence Stroll's team, with the Canadian trailing Alonso by 102 points in the Drivers' standings.
While the Spaniard has enjoyed six podiums in the first half of 2023, Stroll's best result was a fourth-place finish in the third race of the season in Melbourne.
In qualifying, save for Barcelona, the 24-year-old has consistently been outpaced by Alonso.
Stroll's pre-season cycling accident offered mitigating circumstances to account for his performance deficit.
But overall, the Canadian's career in F1 now appears to be stagnating to a worrying degree.
"I think he’s lost his way a little bit," commented Sky F1's David Croft.
"I think he’s lost his mojo and whatever’s happened, Lance just doesn’t seem to be as motivated now as he was at the start of the season.
"And I do wonder are we approaching a time when he’s the one driver on the grid that you think, you’re guaranteed a job as long as your dad is there?
"We’ve never actually talked about contracts with Lance Stroll, never looked at his future elsewhere.
"But I just have a little feeling that in about a year and a half’s time, Lance Stroll will race his last race in Formula 1 and go off and do something else."
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Alonso's priority with Aston Martin is to help the team grow to allow it to fulfil its big ambitions. But a by-product of that commitment is to ensure that Stroll is able to lead the charge once the 42-year-old Spaniard decides to call it a day on his driving career.
"I know what my role is," Alonso told BBC Sport. "Try to help the team to grow in all these areas, try to help Lance as well in anything that I can bring to the team.
"Because I will race for a few more years but I don’t know how many – not so long. And he will race for many more years, and he has to lead the team into the future. So I am happy to help."
©AstonMartin
Alonso enjoys a good relationship with his teammate, but admits that if Aston Martin was fighting for the title, the pair's rapport would perhaps be strewn with tension.
"I don’t think there is much more mystery on this," Alonso added. "We have a good relationship now.
"We are not fighting for the championship. If we were fighting for the championship, maybe there would be less communication or a little bit more tension, between the team or drivers.
"But right now we have very clear goals and we work together in that direction."
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