Honda, Dennis and Fernando Alonso

Ron Dennis and Fernando Alonso to reunite?

As the chequered flag waved for the final time at Abu Dhabi 10 days ago, it was curtains for the 2014 season. Also, it was curtains for the 20 year old McLaren-Mercedes alliance. Now as we look forward to 2015, there are a ton of new prospects. Vettel to Ferrari being a confirmed move, all eyes are now on Fernando Alonso, with his potential record breaking move to McLaren being an open secret, the entire F1 community is curious about the Dennis-Alonso relationship this time around.

After spectacularly falling out with his boss Ron Dennis back in his single tumultuous 2007 season with McLaren, Alonso vowed never to go back to that team in the future.

But as they say, time has the potential to heal everything. And ultimately, it did end up McLaren luring Alonso back to the Woking based outfit once they were on their way to become a factory team with Honda making a comeback following the recent regulation changes regarding the engines.

Pundits and McLaren insiders also suggested that Honda had a major role in convincing Fernando to be a part of the new era for the Japanese engine giant. Honda were absolutely clear that they wanted a superstar number 1 driver in the team while they kick start their comeback campaign.

By superstar drivers, they clearly meant Lewis Hamilton, Fernando Alonso and Sebastian Vettel. But with Vettel having committed to Ferrari and Hamilton in no mood to say goodbye to his championship winning PU106A engine, Alonso was the obvious choice.

With Mercedes clearly the favorites going into the next season,it will be interesting to see where Honda eventually end up on the grid. And as we all know, you don’t have to give Alonso the best car to challenge for the championship, so if the car is relatively competitive, expect him to put up the challenge to the Mercedes duo of Hamilton and Rosberg.

Insiders have also suggested that McLaren were so keen on getting Alonso on board for their new project, that they even gave him technical guarantees as part of his contract, not to forget the humongous salary that he is being paid, which is estimated to be about $50 million a year!

Alonso being an almost done deal, the next question that comes up is the fact that who will be his teammate. According to McLaren insiders, Dennis insists on having Jenson Button with all the experience he has had with Formula One, to help with the engine development in the early stages.

But rationally speaking, Button is in the twilight phase of his career, so the maximum one would able to extract out of him would be a year or two, not more than that. While on the other hand, racing director Eric Boullier suggests on keeping young Dane Kevin Magnussen, seeing him as a long term investment for the team. A rationalist would say that having Magnussen is the right thing to do at the moment, but ultimately it is the team that has the final call over the drivers.

While Honda claim to be on the right track with the development of the power unit and the engine recovery system, it will be interesting to see how far ahead or behind they are of Mercedes in the upcoming season. Will Alonso finally get the 3rd world title he desires ever so much?