• Training Fernando Alonso also flies where he does not play: he opens in Jeddah with the third fastest time

"Peter!" they require him on the one hand. "Peter!" they demand on the other. In the Aston Martin motorhome, Pedro de la Rosa talks to this and that. After his signing last October, at the Jeddah circuit he lives one of his first races as an ambassador, but it seems that he has been in the team all his life. And he has been in the team all his life. "My first job in Formula 1 was as a Jordan tester in 1998, and at the end of the day it's the same team," recalls the driver-turned-dam. The expectations around Fernando Alonso are already a threat and one of his tasks is to stop them. How? It's complicated. His job is to attend to the media, help with marketing and participate in events, but his place is still in the garage, next to the drivers and mechanics, and what he observes there is exciting.

Quick, how many victories will Alonso get this year? (Laughter) On TV they tell me that since I signed for Aston Martin I am a new Pedro, that I no longer get wet and honestly they are right. I will only say one thing: with the great Formula 1 drivers in the end justice is always done. And justice is being done with Fernando. My dream is that he retires being Formula 1 champion again. Would it be a disappointment if this season does not celebrate victory 33? Absolutely not. You have to put the long ones. In Formula 1 we always talk about the next race, but Aston Martin's project is five years and we are in the third. It would be a disappointment if we didn't improve this year and beyond. For the rest, calm and work. At 41 years old, Alonso is in a project for the future. How does he do it? It's unique in that. It is a worldwide example. And not because of what he does now. Motivating yourself at age 41 with a fast car is relatively easy. The difficult thing was to stay competitive for 10 years with cars that sometimes could not even score. It is admirable what he did. He seems really excited. It is. He is excited as a child since he signed for Aston Martin, long before the podium in Bahrain. For how the team welcomed him, for how motivated he saw the staff, for the talent that exists, for the desire to work ... Now it is normal that he is excited, but it comes from afar. In Netflix's Drive to Survive, Alonso defines himself as "the bad boy of the paddock", but in Bahrain he was embraced by Hamilton, Verstappen was full of praise ... Has his role changed? It's that bad boy fame is silly. Maybe it's because he's demanding, maybe because he has that winning instinct. I do not know. In the documentary he says it of. In Bahrain everyone was happy, it's true, and I think it was because of the respect he has earned. Hamilton, for example, has tremendous respect for him, and, hence, the hug. That gesture moved me. The bosses of the teams, Red Bull and Mercedes, reacted differently: they accused Aston Martin of copying their cars. That's a good sign: it means they start looking at us. But beyond that we don't take those comments seriously. They are absurd. The Mercedes and Red Bull are the two most different cars on the grid and we're supposed to look like both of us. You only have to look at the cars to see that it is not true. Without falling into that simplification, how do you explain the incredible improvement of Aston Martin compared to last year? You have to talk about good planning and a lot, a lot of work. As I said before, this project has not just been born: it is its third year. Now they are beginning to reap the rewards, but there have been two years before in which a lot has been invested in hiring talented people and giving them the necessary tools. And there is still a way to go. The new Silverstone factory, which will open this spring, and the new wind tunnel, which will be ready next year. That's it. In 1998, with Jordan, I worked in the same facilities and they have really become obsolete. Right now there are departments that are working on temporary warehouses, in a situation of need. Lawrence Stroll [the team owner] says that a team needs people, processes and tools. Now we have the people and the processes and when the new factory and the new tunnel are inaugurated we will have the tools. He had been out of Formula 1 for a few years. How does it end up in this project? Tell the truth: I knew things. No, no (laughs). A lot of people think I knew things, they make jokes on me on social media. But he didn't know anything until Vettel retired and Aston Martin went for Fernando. My story was an accumulation of circumstances. Last year my daughter went to do an internship at Aston Martin and when I went to the factory, I met the bosses, I ate with the Spanish engineers... I remember one of them told me: 'Let's see if you and Fernando sign for Aston Martín'. And I said, 'Impossible, forget it.' I had a very good feeling there, I saw a very powerful human group, and when Mike Krack [the team leader] called me, I didn't think about it. I have recovered the energy, the desire for Formula 1. There was a day when I was tired of never being home, when I prioritized family life, but my daughters have grown up, it's different. I feel like I can go back to the schoolyard that for me is Formula 1.

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