Fernando Alonso may have set the afternoon pace for
Renault at Magny-Cours, but his morning session came to a more ignominious end as he parked his smoking R28 in front of a partisan home crowd.
The Spaniard had been sixth fastest in the first 90 minutes of action ahead of Sunday's French Grand Prix, but could only watch as his mechanics set about an engine change between sessions in an effort to get him back out on track for vital afternoon track time. Their efforts were rewarded, however, when Alonso pulled out a flying lap right at the end of the second session, bumping Ferrari's
Felipe Massa from top spot on the timesheets in the process.
"I think it has been a good day for us," the double world champion reflected, "The car performed quite well in P1 and P2, I was sixth fastest in the morning session and now fastest in the second session, with good balance. We have made some progress in terms of set-up and new parts that we brought here to this grand prix as well. They seemed to work fine and, for sure, I feel elated as, if we are quicker than the
Ferrari, that would be very much a surprise."
Despite the pleasure that top spot gave him, Alonso admitted that little could be read into his afternoon performance.
"We are not that fast probably, and it's not very important to be fastest today - I'd prefer to finish first tomorrow afternoon," he said, "I think, today, I just need to feel happy with the car, to test something that we plan every weekend, and sometimes you have the opportunity to have a clear answer, sometimes not. Today, everything went perfectly, apart from the failure of the engine this morning, and, in the afternoon, we planned two or three set-up changes, we did them and we had some positive answers. So we're happy because of that, not because of the time."
The engine failure will not bring a penalty for Alonso, as it happened during the freedom of the Friday practice sessions, and the Spaniard insists that it is nothing to worry about with regard to the remainder of the weekend.
