Fernando Alonso succeeds Vettel at Aston Martin
Aston Martin
The rumor mill immediately got going after Sebastian Vettel announced a short while ago that he is hanging up his helmet at the end of this season. Many fingers were pointed at Dutchman Nyck de Vries, who is currently having a great season in Formula E. Aston Martin, however, appears to have chosen someone with a little more experience.
Fernando Alonso
Indeed, already a week after the announcement of Vettel’s farewell, his successor is known. None other than Fernando Alonso will get behind the wheel of the dark green Aston Martin car next year.
Although the Aston Martin team has performed significantly worse than his current team this season -Aston Martin is ninth in the championship, Alpine in fourth place – the Spaniard sees a golden future ahead. “The team systematically attracts the best people, who have already won a lot. I know the team also has good new facilities at the Silverstone factory. Nobody in Formula 1 at the moment has a better vision and more dedication to winning. That’s why this is such a great opportunity for me,” said the 2005 and 2006 world champion.
Baking experience
With a record 346 races, Alonso is the most experienced F1 driver of all time. Aston Martin will be his sixth team since his debut in 2001. The Spaniard previously drove for Minardi, Renault (twice), McLaren (twice), Ferrari and Alpine.
To give an idea of how long Alonso has been around, he is the only active F1 driver who has yet to race against Max Verstappen’s father in Formula One. Other famous names from Alonso’ s early days are of course the Schumacher brothers, but also drivers like Jean Alesi, Eddie Irvine, Jacques Villeneuve and even Johnny Herbert still drove in F1 against Alonso. Drivers like Mark Webber and Felipe Massa even had to make their appearance and are now long out of the picture. Alonso continues to drive for the time being. At least until 2024, as he signs with Aston Martin for several years.
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