Fernando Alonso has admitted a return to Renault was the “only way” he’d come back to Formula 1.
The double world champion is in the middle of preparations to replace Daniel Ricciardo next season, including being on-site at Imola this weekend for the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix.
Commenting on his return to the grid after two years away, however, Alonso began by reflecting on his run in the 2020 Renault at Barcelona earlier this month.
“It was a nice day for two reasons,” he told Formula1.com.
“One, testing a Formula 1 car is always a nice experience and then when you feel the grip again, the braking performance, everything comes so fast.
“And on the emotional part of it, it was nice to be back with Renault, with a lot of the guys that were in the team back in my days with them.
“The only way probably to come back to F1 was with Renault, an environment I knew. It was like a family for me, so those two things were very special that day and I’m now looking forward to the next test.”
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That next outing comes next week in a two-day test in Bahrain using the 2018 car, but as for why Alonso in Italy this weekend…
“It’s a real first look at how we go racing,” said Renault sporting director Alan Permane via GPFans. “Not just to critique it, but to settle himself in for next year so he gets a jump on what we do next year.
“He’s been listening in over race weekends for the past three or four race weekends, I think. He’s got a laptop he can use for the F1 pitwall software so he’s following the cars.
“He’s listening in to our meetings and our session debriefs and our pre-briefs and strategy meetings and stuff like that and this is just the next step.
“He’s not really here to take any active part in the weekend, he’s here to listen and get himself up to speed.”
And being at his optimum is something Alonso admits will take time.
“Difficult to know now,” he admitted. “I guess it will take a couple of races, to be honest, because the limited testing for next year will be a challenge for everyone, but a little bit more for me because I’m out of the car for two years.
“I think winter testing will be only one-and-a-half days and you cannot prepare a World Championship in a day-and-a-half. This is how it is. I will try to create on the simulator some things we need to save time on the real car for fine-tuning the set-up.
“It’s a new team, new steering wheel controls, new procedures, new engineers, a lot of new things that will require a bit of time, but I will try to make it as short as possible.”