"I stopped in 2018, because I had bigger challenges in my head" - When F1 legend Fernando Alonso spoke on retiring for the first time

Formula 1 legend Fernando Alonso revealed amid Sebastian Vettel's retirement that there were several factors that made him choose to retire after the 2018 F1 season. Alonso stated that he wanted to try other racing series where he was much more competitive than Formula 1, such as IndyCar and LeMans.

When mentioning his reasons to the media, he said that similar reasons might have made Vettel give up his seat in the sport. Fernando Alonso said:

"I stopped in 2018, because I had bigger challenges in my head. I had the Le Mans, I had the IndyCar, I wanted to try cross-country rally, so I [had] other challenges."

Fernando Alonso retired from Formula 1 after the end of the 2018 season. At that point in time, he was racing with McLaren in a very uncompetitive car. He had some of the worst race results coming in with the British team. However, in 2021, he returned to the sport with French team Alpine.

Alpine were recently rebranded from Renault at the time, a team where Fernando Alonso won his two world championships. There were high hopes for Alonso's racing career ahead of his return to F1 with Alpine. Though 2021 was satisfactory for him with a podium in Qatar, they have faced many difficulties in 2022 with reliability. The Spaniard has decided to move to Aston Martin in the upcoming 2023 F1 season.

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Fernando Alonso reveals that racing in F1 was 'not attractive' in 2018 and 2019

The era when Fernando Alonso decided to retire was complete Mercedes dominance. The only team who were strong enough to beat them was Ferrari, and McLaren were nowhere near. Seeing any other driver other than Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas win races was rare, and this was a big question for Alonso.

Alonso believes in winning races rather than battling at the back of the grid. He stated that seeing Hamilton & Bottas win every race with Mercedes made him question being in the sport. The Spaniard said:

"In 2018, or '19, the possibilities that I had to race here in the paddock, they were not attractive. It was only one team winning; only [Valtteri] Bottas and [Lewis] Hamilton, they were fighting for each race and each pole position."

Alonso questions whether having a non-competitive car is also the reason for Vettel to retire from the sport at this point in time. He said:

"I don't know if that came to play into Sebastian's decision as well, having a competitive or non-competitive car."

Fernando Alonso revealed that he decided to jump back into Formula 1 because other racing teams were badly hit in monetary terms after the pandemic. He believes that trying to win again in F1 was the biggest challenge for him.

It has been said multiple times that Alonso is still trying to battle for his third world drivers' championship. That justifies his move to Aston Martin because his experience can help them out in developing the car much better and trying to win races.