Fernando Alonso reveals very swift decision behind Aston Martin move

Fernando Alonso has revealed just how quickly he and Aston Martin came to an agreement on him moving there for next season, and it was very swift indeed.

The Spaniard will replace Sebastian Vettel at Aston for 2023, and could be there for three years at least if certain performance metrics are met by both him and the team on a season-by-season basis.

Indeed, the turnaround for 2023 all centred around the Hungarian Grand Prix weekend, with Sebastian Vettel’s retirement announcement sparking off a chain of events that now sees Alonso go green for next year, leaving the blue of Alpine, which in turn has obviously caused a bit of friction between McLaren and the French/British team as they vye for Oscar Piastri’s services.

Whilst that situation is getting protracted, though, Alonso’s agreement to move to Aston was sorted very quickly indeed.

Speaking at the beginning of the Belgian Grand Prix weekend, Alonso explained the sequence of events that played out over a few days, that led to him becoming Aston’s man for next year:

“Everything started when Sebastian announced his retirement on Thursday. I had a telephone call with Aston on Thursday evening and we sit down and we agree on something that we sign on Monday, and we announced on Monday.

“They asked if I had a contract with Alpine for next year, I said no, not yet, only talks until now and they said, ‘what do you want?’

“I said my requirements, they fulfilled all of my requirements, they show me the project, the people that they took, the new facilities. So yeah, it was a 10-minute talk.”

As simple as that.

It’s clear Aston have huge ambition and they appear to have the finances available to them to try and achieve them, so we’ll soon see what unfolds from 2023 with