- Indian Grand Prix - FP2
Alonso unaffected by gearbox issue
Fernando Alonso said his gearbox issue during FP1 for the Indian Grand Prix will not affect the rest of his weekend.
On just his sixth lap of the day, Alonso noticed a problem with his gearbox when shifting up from second to third gear exiting Turn 3 and crawled back to the pits. That ended his morning running, but after catching up with 39 laps in the afternoon Alonso said he didn't expect the issue to impact on his race.
"It was a Friday like any other, apart from a mechanical problem this morning which reduced my track time," Alonso said. "Fortunately, this did not affect the programme too much, with a first session given over mainly to getting used to this track again. It's always important to get the right feeling for a circuit, and especially to try the tyres, that are very important here.
"We also got a first idea of our race pace and also the rate of tyre degradation: we must take into account that track conditions on Sunday will be very different to today's. The situation is not that different to recent races. We are a bit behind in performance terms and tomorrow we must try and get a good starting position to get away well in the race and make it to the podium."
Pat Fry said the gearbox changes made between practice sessions were largely precautionary.
"A problem on Fernando's gearbox restricted his running in the morning session to just six laps," he said. "Some components were changed for reliability reasons and that got him back out on track in the afternoon, when he made up for lost time, working on set-up and the general balance of the car."
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