Thread by @JunaidSamodien_

#AMuS Alpine celebrates fourth place in the World Championship standings. Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso look back on their season with mixed feelings. While Ocon is completely satisfied, Alonso warned of too many failures.

This has only happened to Fernando Alonso once in his career. The team-mate closes the season with more World Championship points than he does. In the first year of the McLaren-Honda drama 2015, Jenson Button finished the team duel with 16:11 points in his favour.

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A little satisfaction for Alonso: He won the training comparison against his English teammate 10:9. Even then, Alonso had a good explanation ready. He lost more points to defects than Button. Alonso recorded eight retirements and reeled off just 4,026 kilometers of racing.

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Button didn't see the checkered flag five times and consequently also achieved the higher mileage. In the end, his speedometer read 4,646 kilometers.

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The story of the 2022 season reads similarly. Ocon beat Alonso with 92:81 points. In qualifying, Alonso was just ahead with 12:10. Again, Alonso's biggest opponent was technology.

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Ocon missed twice, Alonso six times. The Frenchman covered 6,244 kilometers of the race, his Spanish colleague only 5,599 kilometers. "I could have scored 60 points more," Alonso explains the score.

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You could tell from Alonso's reactions how important it was for him to win the internal ranking. The two-time ex-world champion reacted more and more irritably to failures and actions of his team-mate on the track. After all, he thought he had had one of his best seasons.

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"As good as 2012 or 2018." Alonso's benchmark is not championship position, but how well he performs with a car that isn't capable of winning. "For me, a good season is one in which I have everything under control. 2022 was one of those."

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Esteban Ocon also celebrated his third year with the team. "It was a strong season for me and for Alpine. We were behind Alfa-Sauber and Haas at the beginning and finished fourth. The team kept improving our car and we helped with good feedback."

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"We usually have the maximum pulled out of our car." The 2021 Hungary winner only has one criticism: "We weren't rewarded with a podium."

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Ocon's personal highlights are qualifying in Austria and the race in Brazil, where he converted 16th on the grid to 8th in the race with a conservative two-stop strategy. Although Alonso finished three places ahead of him, the veteran had the advantage of three stops, a timely...

[...] safety car and the best tires in the finale. Ocon only mentions the defensive battle against Lewis Hamilton in Suzuka when asked: "The race didn't go the full distance. I know that I can defend myself well, but Lewis would have gotten me sooner or later."

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Alonso fondly remembers the races in Austin, Mexico and Brazil. He lived up to his high standards. The result didn't matter. "Despite the retirement, Mexico was perhaps my best race this year. Because we executed it perfectly from A to Z."

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The fact that he was able to keep up Leclerc's pace in Brazil in the final and fended off Max Verstappen doesn't do him much good.

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"I expect to be as quick as the others if I have the right car. And I had that at the time. My satisfaction comes from races where I can make the difference mentally."

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Both Alpine drivers rate the new cars in unison: "Too heavy, too hard suspension. In the wavy passages you don't really feel the grip because the wheels are constantly in the air," says Ocon.

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After 6 to 7 races, the 26-year-old Frenchman had a good idea of ​​what the car was asking of him. "We kept expanding the window in which the car works and got to know it better at the same time. There weren't as many question marks as there were at the beginning of the season."

Ocon was always slow to get closer to his best. While Alonso got off to a flying start in the first practice session, Ocon always only reached the level of his stable rivals in Q3.

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While Alonso puts it down to the fact that the teammate was approaching what he had presented with data study, Ocon has another explanation ready: "For me it was risk management."

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"There is no price for best times in free practice, in Q1 and Q2. I'm slowly building confidence in my car and going for it when it counts. It's always been that way."

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Despite all the differences, Alonso and Ocon were a good team. Alonso's consistency was the perfect benchmark for the engineers and Ocon an extremely reliable point provider.

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The Frenchman finished 16 of the 22 breakdowns in the top ten and covered the third longest distance of any rider. Alonso will miss Alpine especially in the race. His tire management and his ability to read different strategies are unmatched.

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The team management therefore ordered Alonso's successors, Pierre Gasly and Ocon, to make several factory visits in December. Also with regard to a smooth cooperation.

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The not entirely unproblematic past of the two Frenchmen does not deter sporting director Alan Permane: "We will not accept any stupidity at this level. Both know that they can only get the best result out of the car together with us."

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The sprint in Brazil showed how quickly things can get out of hand. Alonso and Ocon threw away points because they drove into each other's cars in an internal duel.

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Alpine boss Laurent Rossi reminded both of their contractual obligations, with the warning that they could be exchanged at any time if they happened again. That worked. In the main race, Alonso and Ocon delivered 14 points.

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The collisions in the sprint were apparently just the tip of the iceberg of a strained relationship. They looked more harmonious than she was for long stretches.

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When Alonso was asked what he could remember from the two years with Ocon, he mockingly replied: "Many things".

STORY IN GERMAN HERE auto-motor-und-sport.de/formel-1/alpin…