The final race of the 2018 Formula 1 season will be this Sunday at Abu Dhabi. It’s also the final race, possibly ever, of one of the greatest drivers who ever drove a Formula 1 car: Fernando Alonso. Tributes of the man by news outlets have already begun. Though there are still a few days away, I already have goosebumps and feel a bit sad. 

Alonso is a two-time world champion from Spain. Even though his race wins or pole laps never fully reflect the talent of the man, he is well-regarded on the paddock and more than 10 years of watching the sport, I have never heard or read even once that his talent is ever doubted. All I have read is one of the greatest drivers in the history whose career is littered with driving the wheels off his cars, taking a car’s capacity beyond its limits, ill-informed decisions and utterly bad luck. 

I was super elated when he decided to drive for Ferrari, my favorite team. He won in the first ever race with the team! The first 3 years, especially 2010 and 2012, were remarkable and bittersweet. He and the team lost two championships on the final race twice and through bad luck despite having an uncompetitive car. Per BBC in their 5-part story on the man

In the fourth-fastest car, Alonso led the championship for much of the season, taking three outstanding victories along the way in Malaysia, Valencia and Germany. He was overtaken by Vettel in a burst of four consecutive wins by the German in a run of races in Asia in the closing stages of the season. But Alonso lost the title only because of two instances of bad luck.

He was taken out at the start of both the Belgian and Japanese Grands Prix: in Spa by Romain Grosjean’s flying Lotus after the Frenchman tangled with Lewis Hamilton’s McLaren; at Suzuka when the front wing of Kimi Raikkonen’s Lotus punctured his left rear tyre.

Had only one of those incidents not happened, Alonso would have been champion.

The two championships lost in 2010 and 2012 sadden me to this day. I cannot re-watch the final races of those two years again ever. It’s just too difficult to take. 

Though in the middle of two Capstones, I cannot wait to watch, for one last time, one of the greats. Hopefully his McClaren will give him and all the fans, myself included, two hours of Fernando Alonso. 

This is his favorite race win and mine. A spectacular win from 11th position