‘I have a sense of justice and fairness which you have to disconnect in F1’

Fernando Alonso says his Formula 1 career lasted far longer than he expected partly because he learned to accept how the sport is.

The two-times world champion will make his 400th appearance in a grand prix at Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez this weekend. Alonso, who said he originally thought he would leave F1 at the end of 2009, said he learned to tolerate certain aspects of competing in the series, such as the politics and decision-making.

“I did evolve, I learned things, I accepted things which I didn’t at some points in my career,” he told the official F1 channel. “I have a sense of justice and a sense of fairness that you have to disconnect if you are in Formula 1.

“There is no fairness here, there is no justice sometimes, and you have to just deal with the unique things in this sport. There are a lot of politics, there are a lot of interests. There are some decisions that maybe are not so much in the sportive side. It has some some different background on those and you have to accept it.

“If you would like to be part of the circus, you have to accept certain things. If not, you find another category. Which is exactly what I did in 2018. I was not happy with myself, I was not enjoying Formula 1 at that moment. Not only on track, also off-track, the domination of Mercedes. I felt this is the time and I still love motorsport I still love driving cars so let’s try the Indy 500, Le Mans, all these kind of things.

“Then I came back to F1. Enjoying more F1, not because F1 did change too much, it’s because again I accepted things that Formula 1 has and you take it or you leave it.”

Alonso said part of his change in attitude towards the series occured during his two years away in 2019 and 2020. “Earlier, I had a few years that I was enjoying Formula 1 just because the team was giving me that enjoyment and that satisfaction of being a Formula 1 driver.

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“The years at Ferrari I did enjoy, despite the results. I was fighting for championships, I won a few races, I was enjoying Italy, the tifosi, being a Ferrari driver. So those years were a happy place for me.

“Then I joined McLaren, it was the Honda era. We had problems, performance, we had problems with the power unit, all the things we know. But I was enjoying it because my love for Japan, the connection of McLaren-Honda, which was a little bit the inspiration that my father had to…