Alonso admits Ferrari is now third best

Fernando Alonso thinks Ferrari now has the third fastest car behind McLaren and Red Bull following his distant fourth-place finish at the Singapore Grand Prix.

After qualifying fifth on Saturday Alonso was adamant a podium was possible, but in the race he struggled with tyre degradation and finished 55.4s behind race winner Sebastian Vettel. A good start promoted him to third at the start of the race, but he could not keep Mark Webber's Red Bull at bay.

"Unfortunately, today it was impossible to finish on the podium," Alonso conceded. "We were not fast enough and, even if we were third for some parts of the race, we knew that sooner or later we would be overtaken. Sure, if you nail the start and something unusual happens and you do everything perfectly and then some, the podium might come your way, but at the moment, the reality is that our car is third best in terms of performance. Then, as happened today, if the Safety Car wipes out the few seconds advantage we had put together over Webber and the backmarkers, who were maybe a bit distracted, create unexpected problems, then everything becomes more difficult."

He said tyre degradation had been one of the biggest issues in Singapore but is still hopeful of better results later in the season.

"At the start, on the supersofts, we had very high degradation, while on the softs the situation got back to more or less normal compared to Red Bull and McLaren," he added. "We fought all weekend long and I'm pleased with the way the team worked, because they always did their very best and we got the most we could have done out of this race. We have five difficult races ahead of us, but our motivation does not change: at some point maybe we will be able to attack, while there will be other times when we have to defend, but either way, we will always do our best."