FIA President Insists Fernando Alonso Must Not Leave Formula 1 Unsuccessfully

Mohammed Ben Sulayem has drawn a clear line in the sand: Formula 1, he says, cannot allow Fernando Alonso to slip quietly out of the sport in an uncompetitive car.

The FIA president, speaking at an event in Madrid on Friday, was blunt about the prospect of the 45-year-old two-time world champion walking away at the end of a season spent fighting near the back.

“There is no way we can allow Fernando to leave – Alonso, a great champion – to leave just because of the circumstances,” Ben Sulayem said. “That's not the way to leave the stage. He has to be successful and then he leaves whenever he wants, not because he was forced to leave because of the performance.”

A champion stranded at the wrong end of the grid

Alonso’s future is once again a live question in the paddock. Out of contract with Aston Martin at the end of this season, he said on Thursday that his decision on whether to continue in F1 would be made “not soon”, a typically cryptic hint that he is in no rush to commit.

The problem is obvious every weekend. Aston Martin sit 10th in the constructors’ championship, marooned after producing a car that has failed to deliver on the momentum of recent years. The situation is compounded by the performance of engine partner Honda, whose power-unit is currently assessed as the least powerful on the grid.

For a driver who has spent a career dragging midfield machinery into places it had no right to be, this is a different kind of test. The home hero arriving in Spain with no realistic shot at a podium, let alone a win, is a jarring image for a fanbase that watched him dominate the sport in the mid-2000s.

Ben Sulayem admitted he had seen the toll.

“I said to him, I saw him very sad,” he revealed. “And I said, ‘Fernando, I understand, it's not acceptable that you are coming to your own country and now after two times a world champion…’”

The sentence trailed off in Madrid, but the point was clear: a driver of Alonso’s stature should not be reduced to a sideshow on home soil.

FIA chief pushes the limits of his brief

Ben Sulayem then went a step further, explaining that the governing body had already acted earlier this year to help engine manufacturers who are lagging behind.

“We did something earlier, in May, legally for the team towards the engine to go and improve,” he said. “And then I said to him: ‘I am not going to tell you what we are going to do. Please tell me what you want because you are the driver and come and tell me what do you want us to do to improve these results.’”

Those remarks immediately raised eyebrows. A FIA president publicly talking about asking a driver what should be done to improve performance inevitably sparks questions about the boundaries of his role and the independence of the regulator.

The FIA quickly moved to frame the comments.

An FIA spokesperson clarified that Ben Sulayem was referring to Formula 1’s additional development and upgrade opportunities (Aduo) system. Under this mechanism, engine manufacturers whose power-units are judged to be more than 2% down on the benchmark are granted extra scope to upgrade their designs.

“It is a comment about the Aduo process and that he hopes Fernando Alonso stays in the sport,” the spokesperson said. “That is all.”

Pressed on whether Ben Sulayem’s words suggested an overreach from a figure who is meant to administer the sport objectively and at arm’s length from competitive interests, the spokesperson pushed back.

“He is passionate about the drivers, having been one himself, and I really would not read too much into this,” they said.

Legacy on the line

Ben Sulayem’s tenure as FIA president has already been marked by controversy, from governance changes and questions over internal checks and balances to public spats with Formula 1’s commercial rights holders. His intervention on Alonso adds another layer to the picture: a governing body chief talking openly about not wanting a great champion to bow out beaten by poor machinery.

For Alonso, the dilemma runs deeper than sentiment. Stay and gamble that Aston Martin and Honda can close the gap under the current rules and Aduo concessions? Or walk away from F1 with his final laps spent battling for scraps rather than trophies?

The FIA president has made his stance clear. The sport, he insists, should not watch one of its defining figures fade out in the slow lane. Whether Alonso shares that view – and whether Aston Martin and Honda can give him a car worthy of his name – will define how, and when, one of the great careers finally ends.