Fernando Alonso eyeing chance to end Red Bull's 2023 winning streak in Monaco

Fernando Alonso will seek to break Max Verstappen and Red Bull's winning streak and claim his first win since 2013 as Formula 1 resumes this weekend with the 80th running of the classic Monaco Grand Prix.

After floods forced the cancellation of last week's European 'season opener', the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix at Imola, the F1 circus was happy to be greeted by blue skies and warm sunshine in the Mediterranean principality on Wednesday, 24 May.

As visitors sought shade, Alonso and his Aston Martin team contemplated how to gamble on delivering his third win on the old, but glamourised street circuit, where he triumphed with Renault in 2006 and McLaren in 2007.

Box office attraction

After four third-place finishes from five races, the 41-year-old Spaniard has emerged as not only the biggest threat to double champion Verstappen and his teammate Sergio Perez, but also this year's box office attraction, a wily wolf with unrivalled experience.

"We have a car that maybe isn't the fastest on the straights, but very good in the corners," he explained with a flash of his customary mischievous grin.

"So we need to improve that - but it is good for the circuits that are slower like Monaco and Budapest and Singapore."

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Alonso is third in the drivers' title race on 75 points behind Verstappen on 119 and Perez, a street circuit specialist who won last year's race and more recently in Jeddah and Baku, on 105.

"This is the race every driver grows up and wants to win and I was lucky enough to achieve that last season," Perez said. "So, it's made me hungrier to stand on the top step again."

'Anything possible' for Leclerc

Local hero Charles Leclerc of