Failure to inject ‘self-confidence’ limited Alonso success with Ferrari

Former F1 team boss Eric Boullier believes Fernando Alonso’s failure to spur on Ferrari’s troops when it mattered most likely deprived the Spaniard of a world title with the Scuderia.

Alonso secured both his world crowns in F1 with Renault during a two-year winning streak with the French outfit, in 2005 and 2006.

A move to Ferrari in 2010 prefigured another prolific period of success for both team and driver. The association yielded eleven wins between 2010 and 2014, but a world title stubbornly eluded the pair, with Alonso finishing runner up in the championship to Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel on three occasions.

Boullier reckons the Spaniard should have at least been crowned once with the House of Maranello.

“He definitely should and could have another [title],” Boullier said in F1’s latest Beyond the Grid podcast.

“Obviously I know Fernando very well, Abu Dhabi 2010, because it was our car that stopped him from being the world champion, that could have been an opportunity for them.

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“There was another one later, and I think when I use the word ‘could’, it’s always easy to give an opinion afterwards.

“But definitely at that time there was lacking maybe a little bit of self-confidence in the team, and that’s maybe where Fernando could have played a role.

“We expect it from the driver sometimes to reassure people and boost people around you to be self-confident and deliver an even higher service.

“I know at Ferrari, Italian pressure and Italian media pressure is very high. In some ways a guy who can definitely help to make things a little quieter and [give] more self-confidence is the driver.”

Alonso’s move to McLaren in 2015, when the Woking-based outfit initiated its ill-fated collaboration with Honda, led to a prolonged period of underperformance during which the Spaniard often expressed his frustrations with his team’s engine partner, like at Honda’s home race at Suzuka in 2015 when a discontented Alonso infamously barked “GP2 engine” over his team’s radio.

But Boullier denies that his former driver’s negative attitude played any part in the costly McLaren-Honda debacle.”

“No, you can’t say that,” said the Frenchman. “He’s just the most intimate competitor, his life is completely centered around racing and being competitive.

“I think the frustration was just creating these kind of comments, because when he joined McLaren with Honda coming back for him maybe it was to recreate a legacy, different legacy obviously but from what Senna and Alain Prost had been doing with McLaren.

“So it was a lot of expectation I guess and obviously not being as competitive as he would have dreamed of was creating a lot of frustration.”

However, Boullier admits that Alonso was aware, even in the heat of the moment, of the potential fallout that would occur in the aftermath of his scathing mockery of Honda on home turf in 2015.

“I’m sure he knew what he was doing,” added the boss of the French Grand Prix.

“But those comments have been said in a race, if you remember there was a lot of expectation even from himself for this race, and even if he knew what he was doing, I think frustration sometimes is just pushing you to say something you don’t want to say.

“But it’s part of the frustration and I think the ambition he had to really do well with McLaren Honda.”