Alonso Ranks Among True All-Time Greats of F1

Winning the 101st Indianapolis 500 presented by PennGrade Motor Oil this May would move Fernando Alonso one step closer to his goal of achieving an extremely rare Triple Crown in auto racing.

Alonso, 35, from Spain, wants to match Graham Hill’s career achievement of winning the Monaco Grand Prix, the Indianapolis 500 and the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Alonso won at Monaco in 2006 and 2007 and has not yet made a Le Mans start.

But win or lose May 28 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in a McLaren car prepared by Andretti Autosport, Alonso’s legacy is secure as one of the best drivers in Formula One history.

Alonso has won 32 F1 races, sixth on the all-time Grand Prix victory list. He’s one win ahead of 1992 World Champion and 1993 Indianapolis 500 Rookie of the Year Nigel Mansell, who was the last F1 World Champion to arrive at Indy with this much buzz and excitement.

Only multi-time World Champions Michael Schumacher (91 wins), Lewis Hamilton (54), Alain Prost (51), Sebastian Vettel (43) and Ayrton Senna (41) rank ahead of Alonso on the F1 win list.

Alonso won the World Championship in 2005 and 2006, driving for Renault. But he also has finished runner-up three times in the Drivers World Championship, in 2010, 2012 and 2013 while driving for Ferrari.

Two of Alonso’s most renowned characteristics behind the wheel are tenacity and adaptability to varying conditions and car handling characteristics. Those traits began when started karting at age 3, in his native Spain, against competitors more than twice his age. His parents also couldn’t afford rain tires for his kart as a youngster, so he learned to drive in the rain on slick tires.

Alonso went on to win multiple Spanish karting championships between 1993 and 1998, finishing second in the European Championship in 1998.

That success helped Alonso drive on a fast track toward Formula One.

He tested a race car for the first time in October 1998 after an invitation from former F1 driver Adrian Campos. His lap times matched those of Campos’ regular driver, Marc Gene, after three days of testing, so Campos signed Alonso to a race drive in the 1999 Spanish Euro Open MoviStar by Nissan series.

Alonso won in his second start in that series and went on to win the title by one point. He tested for the Minardi Formula One team and moved up to Formula 3000, then the final step before F1, in 2000 with the Astromega team as the youngest driver in the series at age 17.

He earned one victory and finished fourth in the championship behind future F1 star Mark Webber, 2002 Indianapolis 500 pole sitter Bruno Junqueira and Nicolas Minassian.

That success launched Alonso into a full-season F1 drive with small team Minardi in 2001, then the third-youngest driver to start a Grand Prix. Alonso dominated his teammate and also outperformed some better-financed teams, attracting the attention of title-contending F1 teams.

Benetton signed Alonso to a contract, and he became the team’s test driver in 2002.

In 2003, Renault took over Benetton, and Alonso was promoted to a race seat alongside veteran Jarno Trulli. Alonso wasted no time stamping his imprint on Grand Prix racing, becoming the youngest driver to win a pole position, earning his first victory in the Hungarian Grand Prix and finishing sixth in the championship.

A star was born.

That star shone like a supernova in 2005 when Alonso ended a string of five consecutive world titles by Schumacher with his first World Championship. Alonso earned seven wins in his Renault to beat runner-up Kimi Raikkonen to the title by 22 points.

Alonso repeated as World Champion in 2006 with Renault, winning seven races again to edge Schumacher by 13 points.

hen Alonso moved to McLaren in 2007 to be paired with Lewis Hamilton, perhaps the most exciting and promising rookie to arrive in F1 since Alonso.

Both McLaren drivers battled fiercely on track. They both ended up tied for second in the standings, a heart-breaking one point behind champion Raikkonen.

Alonso decided to leave McLaren after one season and returned to Renault in 2008. But that team had lost its competitive edge that Alonso sharpened in the and mid-2000s, and he finished fifth and ninth in the standings in 2008 and 2009.

A new era dawned for Alonso and F1 when he signed to drive for Ferrari, the longest-running and most popular team in the World Championship, starting in 2010.

Alonso finished second in 2010, 2012 and 2013, also earning 11 victories during his five-year stint with the Italian team. But much like his second stint with Renault, Alonso became a victim of a largely uncompetitive Ferrari car during his final seasons with the Scuderia.

So Alonso returned to McLaren in 2015, searching for his first win since his home Spanish Grand Prix for Ferrari in 2013.

Alonso remains respected as one of the top drivers in the F1 paddock by peers, fans and media, often taking lesser machinery toward the front of the grid in qualifying and races.

Polls of drivers and media consistently have ranked him among the two or three best drivers in F1 even during his recent dry spells with Ferrari and McLaren.

Now he will try to convert that incredible skill and silky-smooth driving style into success in his very first oval race – the biggest one of all, the Indianapolis 500.