Alonso: 'It was difficult to get into the rhythm' due to red flags

Alpine's two-time world champion Fernando Alonso made it into Q3 at the Baku City Circuit for the first time in his career, and thanks to Land Norris' three place grid penalty, he will start Sunday's race in P8. He beat teammate Esteban Ocon in qualifying for just the second time this season, but revealed that he found it difficult to negotiate the stop-start nature of qualifying.

Alonso described the session as "messy" and added that: "It was difficult to get into the rhythm and into the pace but it was the same for everybody. I don't used think we used the potential of the car because everytime we put on new tyres, we didn't use it. It's the same for everybody [though].

Whilst he was reasonably happy with his own performance, Alonso is frustrated that those who caused red flags to be brought out remain unpunished. "It's a bit unfair that the people that crashed repair the car and they start in that position tomorrow. All the other cars are in parc ferme until tomorrow and we can not touch the car, so why can they change all the parts when they cause the red flag."

He raises a valid point, and hopes that "maybe one day we will be in that position and take advantage of the rule but as I said let's see what we can do."

Confident for Sunday

On his return to F1 after a two-year absence, Alonso has often struggled to maximise the potential of the A521, shown by his P17 qualifying performance in Monaco.

However, this performance will give alonso great hope of a good points-scoring day on Sunday. "Here you can overtake if you have the pace. We need to look after the tyres. We have reasonable confidence to take good points."