Fernando Alonso: It's useless to make predictions about the weekend in Sepang

I arrived in Malaysia a few days ago after staying a few days in Australia, on Hamilton Island. I decided to stay on this part of the world so as not to lose the time zone habit, given that now two consecutive races await us in the Far East, first in Sepang and then in Shanghai.

It was also important to get used to the particular climatic conditions here, with temperatures around 30°C and, above all, a lot of humidity. I did sport, because training is fundamental: in this race you lose a lot of fluids and it is very demanding to drive in these conditions and you need to be in top physical shape to tackle this weekend in the right way. Being 100% ready from this point of view can make the difference on Sunday afternoon. Even from a mental point of view it is a very particular race.

The fact that weather conditions change so quickly makes the preparation phase for the various phases of track work more stressful. Suddenly we go from sunshine to a very heavy downpour of rain and it is necessary to be prepared for any eventuality. It's not just a problem for us riders but for the whole team: we need to have plans B and C and maybe even D for the various scenarios!

Fortunately, they were not just days of work but there was the possibility of a bit of fun, which serves to unplug a bit in an already very intense period: since the beginning of the tests there have not been many breaks in this part of the season. I remained in contact with the technicians, via email and telephone. We reviewed the progress of the Melbourne weekend and talked about the preparation for the Sepang weekend. We know that we need to improve the level of our performance but we are equally aware that the result of the race was not that disastrous. We will have a little something new in the car but nothing particularly significant or that could make us say that this or that modification is the key to making a leap in performance. I am convinced that we must remain focused on our work and try to understand how to extract all the potential from the 150° Italia which, I am sure, is a lot. Before we do that, there's no point in sitting here making predictions about how the weekend will go. We have to take it day by day.

The best memory of the Sepang circuit is linked to the first pole position of my career, achieved here on 22 March 2003. Neither I nor the team, Renault, expected a similar result that Saturday morning but, at the end of qualifying, we found ourselves with two cars in the front row. It was a great joy and I remember very well how we spent the afternoon, dinner and Sunday morning, spent thinking about how the race would go. Every time I come back here I think back to that weekend, the joy of the pole and the trepidation preceding the race. I didn't win, as happened in 2005 and 2007, but I still came in third place and thus managed to get on the podium for the first time. Definitely a weekend to remember for a long time!