Spanish flyer leaves rivals trailing

By Andrew Benson
Motorsport editor

Alonso is marking himself out as a future superstar Spanish GP report Team profile: Renault

Spain already has the finest football team in the world in Real Madrid, and the signs are that it may not be too long before it can also claim the best Grand Prix driver.

Kimi Raikkonen and Juan Pablo Montoya have already been touted as the sport's next big thing, but many believe Fernando Alonso is even better.

Just five races into his first year with the Renault team, Alonso is already drawing favourable comparisons with the great Michael Schumacher - and a brilliant performace at his home Grand Prix has kept the plaudits flowing.

The 21-year-old Spaniard is third in the world championship, after finishing all five races in the points and putting in some stunning displays in the process.

Good as he was racing with Schumacher in Spain, perhaps his best drive so far was at the Malaysian Grand Prix.

Behind the bare statistics that weekend - when he became the youngest driver ever to take a pole position and finished on the podium in the race - lay an even more impressive story.

It was well known that Alonso had a fever - but still his team were surprised when he came on the radio about 20 laps from the end of the race and asked his engineers to start reading out the gap to Ralf Schumacher behind him.

The team were perplexed because they were already putting the relevant information on the pit board they were hanging out to him at the end of every lap.

Fernando is the sort of driver who will win races when the car should not Mike Gascoyne Renault technical director

It was a few more laps before the reason for Alonso's request became clear.

He came on the radio again and said they might need to have a doctor waiting for him at the end of the race.

He was not feeling very well and he could not see his pit board because of blurred vision - and yet he drove the last 10 laps as quickly as Schumacher in the theoretically faster Williams-BMW.

It is small wonder, then, that F1 insiders are already beginning to make bold predictions about Alonso.

"When Michael Schumacher first came into F1, it was obvious it was only a matter of time before he won a race, and it's the same with Fernando now," says Renault technical director Mike Gascoyne.

"It's hard to put your finger on it exactly. He's obviously blindingly quick. But a lot of people can drive a racing car quickly.

"The ones who are really good have ability to spare - it just comes naturally to them. And Fernando is like that."

FACT FILE Name: Fernando Alonso Born: Oviedo, 29/7/81 Nationality: Spanish Team: Renault First GP: Australia 2001 Best result: 2nd 2002 position: N/A Previous teams: Minardi

That spare capacity was illustrated yet further in that same race in Malaysia.

His gearbox started to malfunction to the point that it would not change gear - a potentially terminal problem. But, Gascoyne says: "He worked out what to do to deal with it before we had the chance to tell him."

That is reminiscent of an incident that happened early in Michael Schumacher's career.

At the 1994 Spanish GP, the German's Benetton became stuck in fourth gear, but after a couple of laps off the pace Schumacher began lapping almost as quickly as before - and went on to finish second to Damon Hill.

"The good guys never need excuses about why they're off the pace because they never are," says Gascoyne.

"That's the big difference between them and the others. If a car is 0.2secs off the pace, some drivers will let it get to them and be a second slower. But Fernando would be exactly 0.2secs off for the whole race.

"You can't shout at him to go quicker, because he's always on the limit. And the mechanics worship him. If he crashes the car, they'd stay up all night over and over again to repair it if they had to because they know he'll go quick in it.

Alonso has scored points in every race for Renault this season

"The guys have seen all the whingers and they know the real deal when they see it."

All of which makes the fuss that surrounded Renault's decision last year to drop Jenson Button in favour of Alonso look a bit ridiculous.

Alonso headed into his home Grand Prix facing what could have been the acid test of his potential.

In Spain, his performances have turned F1 from an unfashionable, almost unnoticed activity into something that makes national headlines.

Alonso had appeared to be taking it in his stride.

"I've got more interesting things to do than think about that," he said before the race in Barcelona.

Nevertheless, his home Grand Prix was always going to be an important test for him - and he came through it with flying colours.

"It will be a measure of him," Gascoyne said before the weekend. "If he sticks it on the podium or something in Barcelona with all the fuss that will be going on around him, and treats it like it is any other race, that's when you'll know he's really got it.

"And I think you'll see him breeze through the weekend as though it is at the Nurburgring, not in Spain.

Which is exactly what happened.

"Fernando is definitely going to win world championships," Gascoyne adds.

"I think Raikkonen could do a Mika Hakkinen, and win a couple of world championships when the car is good, but I don't think he'll be the bloke who wins a race when the car should not, like Michael can.

"But I think Fernando will. He's got that edge. Is Fernando a Schumacher? Yeah, I think he is."