Fernando Alonso driver profile: two titles and a long last act
Fernando Alonso is the oldest driver on the 2026 grid and, on his day, still one of the most difficult to pass. Twenty-five years after his first Grand Prix he is racing an Aston Martin built around Honda works power and Adrian Newey’s aerodynamic thinking, which is either a fitting final chapter or the setup for one more twist.
Fernando Alonso: Fast Facts
- Full name: Fernando Alonso Diaz
- Date of birth: 29 July 1981
- Born in: Oviedo, Spain
- Nationality: Spanish
- F1 debut: 2001 Australian Grand Prix, Minardi
- World titles: 2 (2005 and 2006, Renault)
- Other major wins: Le Mans 24 Hours (2018, 2019), Daytona 24 Hours (2019)
- 2026 team: Aston Martin Aramco-Honda
- Car number: 14
- Team-mate: Lance Stroll
The two titles that ended an era
Alonso arrived in Formula 1 with Minardi in 2001, spent a year as a Renault test driver, and came back in 2003 to win in Hungary as the youngest Grand Prix winner of that era.
Then came the part that defined him. In 2005 and 2006 he beat Michael Schumacher’s Ferrari twice in a row, ending the most dominant run any driver had assembled to that point. He was 24 when he won the first one.
Most drivers with two titles by 25 collect more. Alonso did not, and the reasons are a mix of judgement and luck that people still argue about.
Two decades of nearly
The route after Renault reads like a series of wrong turns taken for defensible reasons.
McLaren in 2007 put him alongside a rookie called Lewis Hamilton, and the season collapsed into open warfare inside the team. Ferrari, from 2010 to 2014, gave him three championship campaigns that went to the wire and lost all three, twice by a handful of points. The McLaren-Honda years from 2015 were worse than unlucky; they were uncompetitive.
So he left. Between 2018 and 2020 he won Le Mans twice with Toyota, won the Daytona 24 Hours, and went chasing the Indianapolis 500. That period is often written up as a detour. It is more useful to read it as a driver refusing to spend his prime in a slow car.
He returned with Alpine in 2021 and moved to Aston Martin in 2023, where a fast start to that season produced a run of podiums and a reminder that the speed had not gone anywhere.
Alonso in 2026
The 2026 project is the most serious car Alonso has had in more than a decade, at least on paper.
Aston Martin has Honda as a works engine partner under the new power unit rules and Adrian Newey inside the building, having taken an ownership position alongside his technical role. Our piece on what Newey’s stake at Aston Martin actually means covers that structure in detail.
Whether the car delivers is a season-by-season question. What is not in doubt is that at 45, in a field of drivers half his age, Alonso is still the one nobody wants to see in their mirrors on the last lap.
For the current championship picture, see our Formula 1 coverage. Profile last updated 2 September 2026.