Fernando Alonso makes his Ferrari debut

Third and final day for Ferrari at the Valencia circuit in Spain as they continue to develop the F10 chassis. Today it was the turn for Fernando Alonso to finally get behind the wheel of the new car and make his official debut for Ferrari. The Spanish driver sporting the no8 on his car was straight onto track as the session opening for his installation lap. A red flag delayed his initial runs but Alonso was soon out lapping the track much to the crowds delight.

Alonso's debut for Ferrari has increased the interest in the test in Spain and around 35,000 spectators are expected at the circuit today, this was also evident as Alonso left and arrived in the pitlane with photographers keen to get very close to the car and driver.Ferrari's technical plan for today is similar to the previous days with work mainly ongoing to find a good base set up for the car, and to test the behaviour of the car with varying fuel loads, as well as working on the behaviour of the new Bridgestone tyres.

Alonso completed a total of 127 laps setting the days fastest time (and fastest time over all 3 days) with a lap of 1.11.470. Ferrari will be back on track at the Jerez circuit on February 10th once again with Fernando Alonso at the wheel.

"I’ve been waiting for this moment for months and finally it’s here,” Fernando said. "We worked at lot at the works over the last weeks, but I was still missing the experience on the track. Today I concentrated mainly on getting to know the car. There were many new things for me here, such as the Schubert helmet and the Brembo brakes I had never used before. I must say that I felt at ease immediately thanks to Felipe’s work during the last days: the car went well and it was fast, it had a good set up, too, which is positive. It’s absolutely impossible to say where we stand compared to the others: I didn’t watch them closely, because I had too much work to do with my team. Anyway it’s far too early to say anything. There are so many unknown factors and it’s a bit like training for football teams, you never know if they’re playing with two goalies or only with their second team. It’s true, we drove many laps over the last three days. To be competitive you need a reliable car and we’re on the right track. The technicians have lots of data now to prepare us the best possible way for the next tests. It’s important that the data we had before we came here has been confirmed on the track. We need to continue like this and in the last tests, we need to try to find the car’s limit."

“I knew that many fans had been expected here, but this was something else. We’re in the middle of the week and it’s incredible to see so many people on the grandstand. This was a very special day for me. Not only because I finally had my debut in red, but it’s also my father’s birthday, who was here with me. I enjoyed every single one of those 127 laps.”