How “surprising” medical tests make Alonso think he could race until he is 50

The Spaniard, who is currently 42, has already defied doubters who reckoned that F1 drivers would be long past their prime once they were out of their thirties.

Now, as he ponders his next steps in F1 with his current Aston Martin contract coming to an end later this year, the two-time world champion says a change of diet and a new approach to fitness has led him to conclude that he has a lot of racing left in him.

That belief has been triggered by his recent annual medical checks at a clinic, which pointed to him not only having unexpectedly arrested a decline that had been spotted in recent years, but to now being in the best shape ever.

“We usually do the same tests,” he said. “The first part we do in the Alps, in Italy, in the mountains.

“We have historical data of my body’s cardio performance in one, two and five kilometres, in a resting state, in a thousand and one tests of fat or muscle, of reaction with the lights, as well as maximums from the gym with weights.

“While in some tests over the last five or six years, there was a minimal drop in performance, especially in terms of muscle, because, from the age of 30 or 35, you lose a little muscle.

“This year, we have been able to recover it to maximum levels. And this has been partly due to nutrition, which has changed.

“We tried to gain a bit of muscle to compensate for the age factor, without losing reactivity or endurance in cardio. These were surprising results, and I think very positive.”

Alonso spoke several times during a pre-launch media briefing at the weekend about the benefit that will come from Aston Martin now having a nutritionist on board.

He says this has “changed a little bit our way of seeing things and prepare the body” as he hinted at moving more towards a vegetarian diet.

“There are many things that they know in terms of explaining better, that it changes maybe more into a plant-based diet,” he explained.

“Maybe not completely strict, but into that route, to try to find a little bit more energy from the food that you eat, and a little bit more from your reserve as well in your body, and try to have more endurance from there.”

Another area Alonso has focused on is ensuring that he does not get run down away from grand prix weekends. He has talked of having a better winter with fewer promotional events.

“I have trained more calmly,…