Alonso jokes he can be called ‘too old’ after a normal performance

Fernando Alonso answered praise for his wet-weather driving with a joke: exceptional performances are treated as normal, he said, while an ordinary one can prompt people to call him too old to drive.

He made the remark with a smile after rain-soaked qualifying in Brazil. Alonso said it was Aston Martin’s first Q3 of the year, but he finished ninth. He said the team had not used Q3 optimally: his tyres were very cold on the first lap and he had no deployment on the second. Alonso thought seventh or eighth was the maximum.