Front row start raises Alonso`s spirits

Barcelona, April 27: Double world champion Fernando Alonso said he was more optimistic about Renault's ability to provide him with a competitive car after qualifying on the front row for his home Spanish Grand Prix on Saturday.The 26-year-old has sounded gloomy about Renault's chances of competing against Ferrari and McLaren but second place on the starting grid in Barcelona, even if his car turns out to be light on fuel, brought a smile to his face.

"I'm more optimistic now, for sure," he said. "When I finished the Bahrain race I was not very happy with 10th place and fighting with a difficult car and not being competitive all weekend, not only in the race.” "We saw another performance from the Renault cars this weekend, so I will arrive at the next grand prix with much more confidence.” "It's a year and a half or nearly two years that they were not on the front row, so hopefully we are coming back." Alonso won his titles with Renault in 2005 and 2006 but the French team have not won since he joined McLaren for one unhappy season in 2007 and then returned. Although the Spaniard was fourth in Australia, they have had to fight to reach the final phase of qualifying and Alonso has scored just six points in three races. Saturday's qualifying changed that, with Alonso on pole until the dying seconds when Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen went quicker. "I was really excited when I crossed the line because I knew the time was good," said Alonso. "I knew that only Kimi was running behind. When I crossed the line I knew that it was the first row in the worst case.” "That is something we didn't expect at all for this race, maybe even the whole season. I cannot be happier than I am now." Alonso said the car felt better, the team had clearly made a big step forward and there were aggressive plans for the remaining races. "This makes me very happy and hopeful of things for the future," he declared. "Hopefully it's the direction that we will go from now on," added the Spaniard, while cautioning that it would be optimistic to expect another front row place in the next race in Turkey. "We made the first step. The next one is to be in the top five and the next one is the podium. This is the programme for the whole season.” "It seems that we managed to make the first step. The other two steps will be even harder but the team is making a great effort to achieve that and I have full confidence in them." Bureau Report