Fernando Alonso has admitted he had preliminary discussions with other Formula One teams before making the “easy” decision to pledge his future to Aston Martin through to 2026.
Alonso’s new multi-year deal, confirmed on Thursday, will keep him racing in F1 until at least age 45.
The future of the two-time world champion has been subject to intense speculation ever since Lewis Hamilton’s 2025 move to Ferrari was confirmed earlier this year.
While Alonso was, at one point, seen as a potential replacement to Hamilton or a potential target for Red Bull, he has pledged his future to the team he joined in 2023.
“It was easy,” Alonso said on Thursday about the new deal. “I needed a few races or few weeks to really think about myself, if I was ready to commit for more years in Formula One, because the calendars are just a little bit more intense now, the car as well, the commitments.
“My love for Formula One and my love for Aston Martin didn’t change, but I just wanted this time to really speak with myself and make the decision and the commitment. Formula One takes all your time, all your energy. You have to give up basically everything in life to keep racing, and I wanted just to speak with myself if I was ready to do so.
“It was also a sense of loyalty that I wanted to express to my team, one year-and-a-half ago, we started together and we achieved so many things, some of them probably unprecedented in Formula One to reach so many highs in such a short period of time.”
Although speculation was rife, Alonso said discussions with other teams were only ever preliminary and part of the process of an F1 driver market.
“I did speak with other people as well, yes. I think it’s normal when you enter negotiations, you need to balance a little bit what is the market. You need to listen to everyone else as well. It’s just a normal procedure, and I think it’s fair to listen to all the proposals and see how the market moves. I don’t know, in my head, Aston was the logical thing for me to do.
“At the end, it was also the best and the most, I felt the most wanted in Aston Martin. All the other conversations were just light, and never came to any conclusions or something like that. Maybe more time was needed, all these kinds of things. While in Aston, it was a clear desire to work together, which was the same that I had. That’s why it came very easy.”
The deal will see Alonso race…
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