Fernando Alonso is hoping he can repeat his qualifying heroics from Barcelona after finishing seventh in Practice 2 in Canada.

The Spaniard used the improved track conditions late in the session, as many were completing race simulations, to complete a low fuel run and jump his McLaren ahead of the likes of Force India, to match the position he achieved in Spain a month ago.

It was a result that even the double world champion admitted was "a little bit" surprising.

“We know our positions are a bit further down, around 10th, 12, 13th,” he said, “but sometimes we manage to put in good laps like we did in Barcelona with P7 so we will try tomorrow."

The lap also put a high note on the end of a somewhat difficult day for Alonso, returning to the F1 track after his Indy 500 appearance. The reason he was late with his flying lap on the ultrasoft tyres was due to a stoppage late in the morning that had left him out of sync with the other drivers on their respective programs.

“I wanted to come to the pit lane to sort the problem but we have an engine issue, a hydraulic problem," he said, explaining what had happened earlier. "So we lost FP1 and then most of FP2 because we didn’t have time enough to prepare the car."

Due to the limited track time, however, Fernando added: “I think the car is not perfectly tuned and the set-up has some room to improve performance so even with those handicaps we are in the top 10, so happy for that. There is more to come tomorrow.

“We know the circuit, we race here many years we should be able to attack qualifying and the race.

"The biggest priority is to be top 10 in the race and for that we need to make a good qualifying tomorrow.”