Alonso heaps astonishing praise on 'magical' Verstappen: 'He's the reference'

Fernando Alonso has showered Max Verstappen with remarkable praise after witnessing his fellow F1 champion's astonishing pole-grabbing performance ahead of the Japanese Grand Prix.

Up until the final moments of qualifying, it appeared as if Verstappen would be staring at an all-McLaren front-row. Then the Red Bull driver delivered nearly 87 seconds of what Alonso has described as 'magic' to steal top spot on the grid from Lando Norris.

Before then, Verstappen had again struggled with the RB21, notably in Friday practice, suggesting at one stage it was 'flexing', further underlining the apparent balance issues within it.

Then from nowhere, given a McLaren had been quickest in all three practice sessions and in the first two periods of qualifying, Verstappen conjured a stunning lap, that even left him surprised, by 0.012s over Norris.

Two-time F1 champion Alonso rightly acknowledged the performance.

"He's an outstanding driver, and he's proving it every weekend, so hats off to him," said Aston Martin driver Alonso, speaking to media, including RacingNews365.

"The lap he did is only down to him. The car is clearly not at the level to fight for pole or even top five. but he manages to do those magical laps and have magical weekends.

"At the moment, he's the best. He's the reference for all of us, and we need to keep improving to reach that level."

After qualifying 13th, Alonso will start P12 after fellow Spaniard Carlos Sainz was handed a three-place grid penalty for impeding Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton in Q2.

Alonso was again left bemoaning his car, particularly after seeing the likes of Racing Bull's Isack Hadjar, Alex Albon in his Williams, and Haas driver Ollie Bearman all reaching Q3 and ahead of him on the grid.

"I'm extracting the maximum," he said. "I'm happy with the laps. I put on full sets of tyres - two in Q1, two in Q2 - free traffic laps, and this is the time I can get.

"I'm not totally confident with the car. Even when I pushed in Turn 8 [in Friday practice], I lost the car. It's a very fragile car at the moment to push, and we need to improve it. The car is just maybe not top-10 material at the moment.

"The hope is, with two- or three-tenths improvement in the package, you can make a lot of places, and that's what motivates us at the moment, to keep on working."