Alonso: WEC crown wouldn’t be on par with F1 titles

Fernando Alonso says winning the FIA World Endurance Championship would not rank on the same level as his two Formula 1 world championship titles.

The Spaniard, who won his F1 titles in successive seasons with Renault in 2005 and 2006, now stands on the verge of adding the WEC crown to his growing list of achievements after taking victory alongside Toyota teammates Sebastien Buemi and Kazuki Nakajima in a crazy snow-hit race at Spa.

Alonso is in prime position to seal the WEC title at his first attempt before leaving Toyota at the end of the 2018/19 season.

Asked if he feels it would match the feeling of winning his two F1 titles, Alonso said: “No, I don’t think so.

“I think Formula 1 is the biggest category in motorsport. That’s the way it is. Also it depends on the difficulty of the championship, how you rank all of the things.

“This year, we have a very dominant car. I’m sure [Lewis] Hamilton doesn’t rank the championships the same in 2008 or the last four championships. I think it’s different.”

Alonso and the #8 crew are clear favourites for the title, with the #7 Toyota trio of Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and Jose Maria Lopez 31 points behind its sister entry with only 39 points left available at the season-ending 24 Hours of Le Mans in June.

“Definitely it was a big hit in terms of points,” Alonso explained. “I’m thinking more of Silverstone [where both Toyotas were excluded] or Shanghai [where the #7 car finished ahead due to strategy], that probably we deserve a lot more points than what we have and with those points, we were already mathematically champions.

“But now we [just] need to finish at Le Mans. It seems easy, because last year we finished one-two without any problems, but if I look back in the history of the race there, finishing the race is not that easy.

“We need to be very, very careful, we need to be very sharp and very concentrated all through the race, because anything can happen in a 24-hour race.

“Obviously we are in the same position as our sister car, and they need a lot to happen to us and nothing to them. If we try to copy their race, we can be safe.”