Ferrari driver Fernando Alonso was in a positive frame of mind after the opening two practice sessions for this weekend's Chinese Grand Prix, with the two-time World Champion delivering a time strong enough to end the day third quickest.
Although team-mate Felipe Massa holds the early upper hand at Shanghai after topping the timesheets in this afternoon's second session, Alonso is confident that he has a strong platform to build upon ahead of final practice and qualifying.
"By the end of the day, the overall feeling is positive," Alonso commented. "We worked well and on top of that, it’s always great fun driving the Shanghai track.
"From one session to the next the track improved significantly, because the other categories that ran after our morning session cleaned the surface. The increase in temperature means the conditions were very similar to those predicted for tomorrow."
Like many of his rivals, Alonso says getting on top of Pirelli’s tyre compounds is proving to be the biggest challenge, while explaining that Ferrari faces important decisions over which new parts it tested will be carried over for the rest of the event.
"Once again, tyres will play a key role in this Grand Prix because of the high level of degradation over a long run," Alonso added. "We will have to ensure we pick the right strategy for Sunday, as well as deciding on which of the new parts we tried this morning to fit to the car. As usual, we can expect a long evening studying the data."
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