Ferrari Support Alonso's Attacking Style in Malaysia

Even though his pace in qualifying was far from perfect, Ferrari's Fernando Alonso could have walked away from Sepang with a podium finish. During his last stint, the Spaniard caught up with McLaren's Lewis Hamilton in a matter of laps and it seemed that passing his former teammate would be a question of minutes.

However, after continuous attempts to pass the British driver, Alonso cracked under pressure and made contact with the rear-right side of Hamilton's MP4-26, damaging his wing while trying to overtake him. That resulted in an unscheduled pit stop for the Spaniard and, consequently, a “relegation” to 6th overall at the finish line.

As Alonso labelled the incident as “something that happened when you race”, Ferrari also backed their driver's attacking style at Sepang, with team principal Stefano Domenicali convinced that the Spaniard would have battled for 2nd place hadn't it been for the contact with Hamilton.

“I like the way he is driving, it is fantastic, but the other consideration is that we need to consider this year is that if you go off line it is a big problem,” said Domenicali, hinting that driving outside the racing line, on the side of the track that was full of rubber marbles, definitely played its part in the incident.

“The track is all dirty with the marbles, so you try to keep your line and, if you just go off the line, you put the marbles on the tyres and you lose performance.”

“So that is a tricky situation this year - that if you do have a chance to overtake with a clear situation then you have to take some risks because it is not easy. That is the way it is, because without the problem on the rear wing I think we could have really attacked.”